CHARACTERS
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- Juliet
- Romeo
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This set of lesson plans focuses on characters in Romeo and Juliet, along with some bonus content. Follow along with them or choose activities and resources to supplement your teaching.
JULIET (LESSON)
Learning Objective
To explore Juliet’s characterisation.
Downloadable Resources
Starter (15 mins approx.)
Start reading Act IV Scene 1 from after Paris leaves. Read the scene out loud – you could involve the whole class by one side of the room being Friar Lawrence and the other Juliet, and each student taking it in turns to read an entire line (from punctuation to punctuation) in turn, or if you have two very strong readers, just nominating them to read while the others listen. While this reading is going on, ask students to highlight all references to death and violence in both speeches.
When the reading is finished, ask students to share their first impressions of this exchange, and what highlighting the references to death and violence has shown them. Does anything surprise them about the behaviour they see in this scene, from either character?
Main activity (25 mins approx.)
Ask half of the class to just look at Juliet’s lines in this part of the scene, and the other half to just look at Friar Lawrence’s. For the students looking at Juliet’s lines, they can work in pairs or individually, depending on how much challenge you want to give them.
See the downloadable lesson plan for the full activity, prompt questions and more.
Plenary (15 mins approx.)
Ask students to write a short analysis of the exchange between Juliet and Friar Lawrence – what does it reveal about them as characters?
Bonus: Juliet and Lord Capulet (15 mins approx.)
Look at Act III, scene 5 Edit (PDF). Ask students to choose either Juliet or Lord Capulet. They need to imagine they are a Director, writing notes to the actor playing the part of the character they have chosen. What would they tell them about their character and how to play their role in this scene?
Students should think about how their character is feeling, what they’re thinking, what they want, and what tactics they are using to try and get what they want. They should use quotations to point to specific elements of the text.
Felixe Forde as Juliet in Playing Shakespeare with Deutsche Bank: Romeo and Juliet in 2024.
ROMEO (LESSON)
Learning Objective
To explore Romeo’s characterisation.
Downloadable Resources
Starter (15 mins approx):
Watch the section of the scene from Romeo opening the tomb to find Juliet, to Juliet’s death. A theatre version is preferable to the Baz Luhrmann film if possible, as it veers away from the text slightly and is also much longer than stage versions tend to be.
While they are watching this section of the scene, ask students to write down what elements they can see that are tragic. Discuss their immediate thoughts after watching.
Main activity (25 mins approx.)
Give students the Romeo edit provided. Ask them to work in pairs to identify all the examples of imagery/metaphor they can find in the text and highlight them. Ask them to explore the nature of these images and what they convey about:
a) Romeo’s influences and imagination
b) The nature of Romeo’s feelings for Juliet
In what ways do these images help to create Romeo as a figure of tragedy? How do students respond to his depiction? Do they feel his emotions are genuine? Share ideas with the class.
Plenary (10 mins approx.)
Ask students to now look at Juliet’s final words towards the end of the scene.
How do these compare with Romeo’s? Can they notice any imagery? How do Juliet’s factual and pragmatic final words make them feel compared to Romeo’s? What do these very different final speeches tell us about Romeo, and about Juliet? Which is more tragic to a contemporary audience? Do they think Shakespeare’s contemporaries would have felt the same?
Discuss their ideas as a class.
SPEECHES
BONUS ACTIVITY
Prologue (15 mins approx.)
Ask students to consider who might speak the Prologue and what impact this might have on how the audience approaches and interprets the events of the play.
The play’s stage directions tell us that the ‘Chorus’ enters, but ‘Chorus’ is not a character, and could potentially be spoken by anyone in the play.
Some productions have chosen to have a character from within the play who is still alive at the end – such as the Prince, or Friar Lawrence, speak the Prologue. Others have chosen to have a Stage Manager or an actor wearing their normal clothes speak the Prologue, emphasising the fact that the Prologue is a metanarrative device.
Given what we have already learned about how the Prologue works in terms of setting us up with a particular perspective on the play, who do they think would be an interesting person to speak the Prologue, and why?
Ask students to discuss on their tables before sharing their ideas.
Remind students that there are no right or wrong answers, and Directors’ choices on this casting will depend on what angle/perspective they are exploring in their productions.
Finally, ask students to write a short summary paragraph to explain what they have learned today in their exploration of the Prologue.
Simeon Desvignes as Paris and Gethin Alderman as Capulet in Playing Shakespeare with Deutsche Bank: Romeo and Juliet in 2024.
