Tony-nom Lorna Courtney’s path to ‘& Juliet’ lead role was far from star-crossed

NEW YORK — Lorna Courtney, one of South Ozone Park’s brightest new talents, has taken Broadway by storm as the lead in “& Juliet,” a role she feels she was destined to play.

The critically acclaimed production, which remixes the ending of Shakespeare’s iconic love story with chart-topping hits from the likes of Britney Spears, Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson and Celine Dion, garnered nine 2023 Tony Award nominations, including a best leading actress nod for Courtney as Juliet Capulet. The honor is a first for the Queens native in her first leading role.

Backstage at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre on West 43rd Street, the 24-year old actress told The Daily News that she was shocked to receive the nomination.

“I was so excited when they started listing all of the people, the actors in my category, and I was cheering them on,” she shared. “And they got to my name. And I was shocked. And I was at my best friend Rae’s house and we just started jumping up and down and screaming. And I got to eat cake at like, 9 am. It was great.”

The Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts alum had played understudy and supporting roles in “Dear Evan Hansen” and “West Side Story” before taking on Juliet, and carrying a show for the first time felt “incredible and overwhelming, but in all the right ways.”

She originally had her sights on a supporting role in “Jagged Little Pill” that went to another actor.

Luckily, producer Eva Price and casting director Stephen Kopel had her in mind for something else . “There was a reason why I didn’t get Frankie, because Juliet was waiting for me,” she said.

Before “& Juliet,” Courtney knew more about Max Martin’s iconic pop songs than the actual classic Shakespearean tragedy.

“I didn’t watch the movie until I got the role,” she confessed. “I didn’t even know that Leonardo DiCaprio did a movie version of it because I want to say it came out before it was born.”

While she’s deeply familiar with “Macbeth” and “Cleopatra,” the closest she got to having a relationship with “Romeo and Juliet” was through “West Side Story,” which is loosely based on the Bard’s famous play.

Courtney told The News she’s having the time of her life wowing theater audiences with a new story — scripted by “Schitt’s Creek” writer David West Read — about what would have happened if Juliet went on to live a new life after the death of Romeo. Getting to belt out pop chart-toppers like Britney Spears’ “Oops! … I Did it Again,” and Ariana Grande’s “Problem” on Broadway is the icing on the cake.

“It’s something that you don’t think would work but it does, it works so well,” she said of the show, which has a multicultural cast reflecting diversity when it comes to age, body image and gender.

“I think this kind of takes the jukebox musical and just flips it on his head,” Courtney shared. “And we know that we are a jukebox musical. We acknowledge that because we start with the jukebox on stage and we finish with the jukebox on stage. We embrace it. But you kind of hear the words differently. Even though you know the songs, you you understand it’s through the lens of the characters which are telling the story. And you really fall in love with the characters and can relate to them.”