Shakespeare reimagined in Petr Zuska's Romeo and Juliet (or Queen Mab and Friar Lawrence): Dancing with decolonial partnership opposites

Within the interdisciplinary critical framework of partnership and decolonial studies, this paper examines Petr Zuska's innovative choreographic adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, which premiered at the National Ballet Theatre of Prague in 2013. Drawing inspiration from Mercutio's monologue, the Czech choreographer reimagines the Bard's text by shifting the focus to Friar Lawrence and introducing a pivotal new character: Queen Mab. In Zuska's ballet, Queen Mab emerges as the true protagonist, a dancer both angelic and cruel, who influences the characters' choices and seal their tragic fate. As in many of Zuska's works, the tension between good and evil lies at the heart of his "performative" praxis (Schechner 2002), expressed through a continuous interplay of intertextual references and corporeal symbolism (Adshead-Lansdale 1999). These elements probe the depths of human desire, vulnerability, and moral fallibility. The battle between Queen Mab and Friar Lawrence reflects the broader conflict among Romeo and Juliet's families and peers, while their physicality and gestures offer a powerful meditation on the human condition - suggesting that suffering, both rational and irrational, is inescapable. Building on Riane Eisler's theory of "partnership" (1988) and Madina Tlostanova's declination of the "decolonial option" (Mignolo, Escobar 2010; Mignolo, Walsh 2018) as it applies to Central and Eastern European space, this analysis first explores Zuska's original portrayal of opposing forces, and then his reinterpretation of the tragedy through neoclassical dance, using movements rich in symbolic meaning. The paper concludes with a brief analysis of the lovers' pas de deux, which embodies a more liberated vision of existence - an idea already latent in Shakespeare's text - and underscores how love, partnership, and acceptance are the only pathways to transcend destruction, misunderstanding, and violence.