Director's cut: Exhibits inspired by "Romeo and Juliet"

One of the subtle pleasures of the new exhibition spaces at the Folger is that the rare items on view from the collection come and go over time, since each one will only be exhibited and exposed to light for a given period. For returning visitors, it means that there may be something different on view—even when exploring the same exhibition—with new selections often complementing Folger programs.

For example, the “Out of the Vault” exhibition, housed at one end of the Stuart and Mimi Rose Rare Book and Manuscript Exhibition Hall, displays objects from the collection connected to different activities, such as scholarly research, the acquisition of new materials, stage performance, and more. During Folger Theatre’s production of Romeo and Juliet, the “on stage” performance section has shifted to an entirely new trio of rare and intriguing objects, chosen by the play’s director, Raymond O. Caldwell, in collaboration with Folger curators.

Caldwell, who also wrote descriptions of the items, highlights the resonances between these objects, which reflect everyday life in early modern times, and the themes of the play—and also suggests the hidden, real-life drama conveyed by each one of them.

IRL love letters

Nowhere is this more evident than with a secret love letter from the Folger collection, written in 1611. The letter, from Jane Skipworth to Lewis Bagot, was folded into a tiny packet, closed with dark pink silk floss and a wax seal, and addressed, “To my very good frend Mr Lewes Bagott giue this”; it was probably hand-delivered by a trusted servant. The display also includes a reconstruction by the Folger conservation team of how the letter would have looked, folded up, when Lewis received it.

“With this letter, I wanted to connect audiences to the real love story of Jane Skipwith and Lewis Bagot,” Caldwell writes. “From the gilt-edged Italian paper to the expressive italic handwriting to the delivery, Jane’s secret letter tells us much about the lengths young folx will go for love. PS: Jane and Lewis’s love ends just as tragically as Romeo and Juliet’s.”

An apothecary’s invoice

Caldwell also included an early modern apothecary’s bill to Sir Roger Townshend to echo key elements of the Romeo and Juliet story, including the poison that Romeo purchases. “I was drawn to this apothecary bill because I was interested in thinking about the history and price of medicine,” he writes. “Not only have drugs always been expensive and available, some of them were also unknowingly deadly (like mercury).”

A how-to manual

The most visual object, however, is a recently acquired work from 1638, Directions for muskers. “The characters in our production fight one another with butterfly knives,” Caldwell writes, “but there is the ever-looming presence of guns. I was drawn to this book because of the detailed illustrations (printed from etched metal plates), which show how to use various weapons. If you look carefully at the musket in these directions, you’ll notice the gun is so long that it requires a kickstand!”

Still More Stunning Romeo and Juliet Items

In addition to Caldwell’s group of objects in “Out of The Vault,” there are rare and intriguing Romeo and Juliet items on view in the Shakespeare Exhibition Hall, displayed at each end of the hall.

In print

The “Shakespeare Is…” area near the west entrance to the hall includes the first printed edition of Romeo and Juliet, the 1597 quarto. Quartos of several of Shakespeare’s plays—smaller, one-play books—were published during his lifetime. The quarto is open to the play’s Prologue, where readers first encountered the play in print.

In porcelain

At the other end of the exhibition hall, near the east entrance, you can find an entirely different perspective on Romeo and Juliet, in a very different form and from a much later era: a 19th-century porcelain figure of the actress Charlotte Cushman, playing Romeo, and her younger sister, Susan Cushman, playing Juliet. Our Shakespeare Unlimited podcast episode Charlotte Cushman: When Romeo Was A Woman  includes the story behind this very popular casting choice of the two sisters, which was often depicted. Charlotte Cushman, who played both male and female Shakespearean roles, was among the finest and best-known American actresses of the 19th century and the first to achieve international fame.