The Beacon Theatre presents Romeo & Julian, a bold, modern queer retelling of Shakespeare’s classic. It follows the forbidden love between the sons of two rival religious leaders (one Southern Baptist and one Catholic) in the small town Verona, Texas, where being gay is the town’s gravest sin. They find refuge in each other and in a found family, led by the dazzling drag matriarch Mother Laurence, who runs a queer sanctuary called The Church.

The contemporary adaptation preserves much of Shakespeare’s language while updating appearance, themes, and context to deliver a fierce, tender, and visually electric take on a story about love, defiance, and the families we choose.