![A graphic with a light pink heart background. In the foreground, Kit Connor is in a grey top and beige jacket, and there is a screenshot of his instagram page, on which he has posted a cryptic "R".](https://www.thepinknews.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Kit-Connor-heartstopper-broadway-romeo-and-juliet.jpg?w=792&h=416&crop=1)
Equipment Connor is teasing an enormous Romeo and Juliet themed announcement. (Getty/Canva/Instagram)
Heartstopper star Equipment Connor’s will star as Romeo in an Broadway adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet alongside The Starvation Video games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes actress Rachel Zegler.
The 20-year-old actor revealed the information by way of his Instagram web page, someday after cryptically teasing his subsequent large undertaking.
Romeo and Juliet on Broadway will start this autumn, and can characteristic music from frequent Taylor Swift and Lana Del Rey collaborator, Jack Antonoff. It is going to be led by Enjoyable House director Sam Gold.
On Monday, (15 April), Connor – finest identified for enjoying Nick Nelson, Charlie Spring’s boyfriend in Netflix’s teen drama Heartstopper – cryptically posted an “R” on his Instagram profile, sending followers right into a spiral and leaving them guessing about what was coming subsequent.
The turquoise letter appeared subsequent to half of a “+” image within the graphic, with followers left assuming that there was a second a part of the picture someplace on Instagram.
And so they have been proved right.
On the identical time, Zegler had posted the opposite half of the picture, with the letter “J”.
As mysterious because the pair tried to be, captioning the photographs with only a coronary heart and a sword emoji, followers have been very fast to guess that “R + J” in all probability stood for Romeo and Juliet.
Including gas to fireside, Connor was later noticed following a newly created Instagram account known as “romeojulietnyc”. Plus, he tagged the situation of his Instagram submit as “Verona”, the Italian metropolis through which Shakespeare’s tragedy is famously set.
Followers subsequently concluded that Connor would quickly be swapping the corridors of Truham College for Broadway, with the pair starring on stage because the star-crossed lovers.
“Wait… there’s no manner… [Kit] and Rachel? I’m so cooked,” declared one social media person.
A second wrote: “Equipment Connor and Rachel Zegler in Romeo and Juliet, I can’t do that, I can’t breathe.”
And a 3rd warned: “If Equipment Connor and Rachel Zegler are taking part in Romeo and Juliet, I’ll develop into essentially the most annoying particular person on Earth.”
One other merely wrote: “It’s Broadway, child.”
Connor has beforehand appeared on stage, in London productions of Welcome House, Captain Fox! and Fanny and Alexander, previous to his Heartstopper fame.
Connor will probably be followin gin the footsteps of on-screen boyfriend Joe Locke in heading to Broadway, who not too long ago acquired his large theatre break by starring as Tobias Ragg in Sweeney Todd.
Spider-Man actor Tom Holland is ready to star as Romeo within the upcoming West Finish manufacturing of the play, reverse Black Unhealthy Schooling actress Francesca Amewudah-Rivers. The half has historically been performed by white actresses.
A whole lot of predominantly Black, feminine and non-binary actors condemned the racist abuse geared toward Amewudah-Rivers after her casting announcement was introduced.
An open letter condemning the discriminatory feedback, signed by the likes of Ghosts star Lolly Adefope, former Physician Who companion Freema Agyeman, and On Chesil Seashore‘s Tamara Lawrance, learn: “The racist and misogynistic abuse directed at such a candy soul has been an excessive amount of to bear.”
Romeo and Juliet is because of open in London on 11 Could and run for 12 weeks.
Tickets for Romeo and Juliet on Broadway will go on sale in Could.