Waiting for Julieta - a Bold Mexican Reimagining of Shakespeare’s Tragedy comes to Voila! Theatre Festival 2025

Barons Court Theatre: 9^th – 11^th November at 9.30pm

Award-winning production explores gender, identity and the myths of romantic love through a northern Mexican lens.

The acclaimed Mexican production Waiting for Julieta, created and performed by Emmanuel Pichardo Caballero, will be presented at the Voila! Europe Theatre Festival 2025 this November at Barons Court Theatre.

A contemporary reworking of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Waiting for Julieta unfolds during a carne asada, a Mexican gathering with tacos and tequila, where theatre meets cabaret, performance art and pop culture. Blending humour with social critique, the piece revisits one of Shakespeare’s best-known tragedies to question romantic ideals, gender roles and the (self)destructive behaviours born from love.

Set within this environment, Waiting for Julieta examines how ideals of love and identity are formed and constrained by the expectations of a society that prizes conformity and traditional values. Drawing on lived experiences from the region, the work exposes the tension between personal freedom and social obligation, using Shakespeare’s tragedy as a framework to question the persistence of rigid gender roles and romantic myths. In doing so, it situates a universal story of desire and defiance within the particular realities of northern Mexico today.

Premiered in 2022 at Casa Teatro Reynosa, the production has since toured across Mexico including Mexico City, Nuevo León, Coahuila, Durango and Tamaulipas, and has appeared at international festivals such as the Festival de Teatro Latino (UTRGV, Texas), the Festival Internacional de Cabaret (Mexico City) and the PinSpot Festival (Reynosa). In 2023, it received the Best Play Award at the Mtro. Rafael Solana Theatre Contest.

“For years, I’ve been waiting for the moment when I could play Julieta Capuleto in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, but I was born a man in this shitty and sexist country... Finally, the wait is over; today, I am her.” – Emmanuel Pichardo Caballero

Waiting for Julieta will be performed at Voila! Theatre Festival at Barons Court Theatre on 9th November to 11th November 2025. For tickets and more information, visit: https://www.voilafestival.co.uk/events/waiting-for-julieta-3/