Tonight Capulet, tomorrow Montague Aquila shuffles actors, with mixed results

Being on the road can be boring for actors in a touring show. They play the same roles each night, speak the same lines, wait for the same laughs. So when Peter Meineck, artistic director for Aquila Theatre Company, cast the touring production of “Romeo and Juliet,” he asked six actors to learn each of the 13 roles for this spring’s touring adaptation of Shakespeare’s story of star-crossed lovers. Not only would it keep the action fresh, but it might lend some insight into gender roles (since men might end up playing women, and the other way around), and hark back to the origins of the Globe Theatre, where the actors were all male.

Talk about a twist-of-fate story. Imagine going to work every day and having a new job. And more: Your clients get to choose which job you do.

That was the opening setup Tuesday, when Aquila actors arrived onstage at the Maine Center for the Arts and announced that the audience would choose their fates by picking names out of little bags each actor held. Would the burly guy be Juliet? Would the blond woman be Friar Lawrence? Into the audience the actors went, and in a matter of seconds, the show was cast anew.

Given all the possibilities, it was rather disappointing when Juliet ended up being a waifish cutie (Lindsay Rae Taylor) and Romeo the hot dude (Andrew Schwartz). They were fine enough in the roles, but instead of exciting identity-bending moments between them, it felt more like an episode of “Friends.” Ah me. Or as the considerable number of high-school students in the audience might say: Whatever.

One of the hallmarks of Aquila, which has garnered loyal fans (me among them) in the area, is the energy it brings to classic works. Tuesday’s performance got an additional electric charge from the younger audience. The room never really settled down to its traditional pin-drop mode.

Case in point: During Capulet’s impassioned speech to his daughter about marrying the man of his choice, the kid next to me was text-messaging the girl next to him, and the girls behind me were whispering in a steady thrum. And if that weren’t enough, the senior citizen next to me had to have her requisite showtime candy fix, the unwrapping of which took centuries.

Fortunately, Kenn Sabberton’s performance of Capulet was gripping enough to win back my attention. In fact, Aquila has a smart approach to building suspense and engagement for works that young and old alike sometimes find boring. Those of us familiar with Shakespeare don’t really go to hear the plays so much as to see a director’s vision. But when companies such as Aquila, made up of actors from the U.K. and the U.S., can grab the interest of new and old audiences, it creates a powerful tool for sharing culture and creating transformation.

Meibeck’s direction is responsible for some of that. Then performers such as Basienka Blake (Tybalt, Montague and Friar Lawrence) and Louis Butelli (Mercutio, the Nurse and Paris) step into the lights with storytelling skills that outdo modern technology and even loud gum-chewers. They remind us to give up our assumptions about what makes a Montague or a Capulet, a man or a woman, a teen or an adult.

In the end, “Romeo and Juliet” was not my favorite of the Aquila productions. With big performers in the supporting roles, the two leads felt thin. And for all the delicious bawdiness on the outskirts of the action, the romantic love at the heart of the story fell flat. That may be one of the dangers of role shifting. Or it may be the luck of the lottery.