Liam Pearce Channels His Inner Rockstar as Romeo in & Juliet on Broadway

Liam Pearce made his Broadway debut in the 2023 coming-of-age musical How to Dance in Ohio, about a group of young adults with autism preparing for a spring formal dance. Based on a true story, the production starred seven autistic actors, including Pearce as Drew. While Broadway's & Juliet—where Pearce currently plays Romeo—can also be seen as a coming-of-age story, the similarities seemingly begin and end there. In the Max Martin-soundtracked jukebox musical, Romeo is painted as pretty rather than smart, a flirtatious bad boy who gets around Verona. But as the actor tells Broadway.com, he brings a surprising amount of himself to the role, including parts of his autism.

15 months into his run in & Juliet, Pearce opens up about how he keeps the rock-and-roll energy going show after show, reveals his favorite song to perform onstage and weighs in on his other dream Broadway roles. (Hadestown fans, wait for him!)

In How to Dance in Ohio, being an actor with autism was central to the role. Can you talk about what that meant for you?
I think about it all the time. It was one of the first big gigs I got post-graduating. I graduated in 2022, and by the time I graduated, I knew that I was going to be doing the out-of-town for that in the fall, and I'd done a workshop of it before. It was the perfect way to break into this business, because I was surrounded by people who were so similar to me in such a special way, which is autism. I have never had an experience like it, and I doubt I will for a long time. The collaboration in that room and the care that both the creative team and the cast had for each other, because it was such a sensitive subject and the topic of the show, was really beautiful. I learned so much about myself and so many validating things about my own autism by being surrounded by other autistic people, specifically autistic actors. Up until that point, I'd never really spent a ton of time around other neurodivergent people, but to be with that group was so affirming and incredible to myself as an artist, but also as a person. I loved every second of it. Those guys are still such good friends.

In & Juliet, you play an entirely different character. Are there any parts of yourself that you bring to Romeo?
Absolutely. There are parts of me, even parts of my autism, that I definitely bring to him. He has a special interest in a person in the show; he loves Juliet. So much of him is so douchey and his emotions are misplaced a lot of the time. He is so overdramatic and presenting of everything—but I think at its core, none of it is ingenuine, and he really does love her so much. It's a little bit misplaced, but he does have a special interest in her, which is really nice to be able to play with. We've been talking recently—because we still talk about the show and we still check in about everything—[about how] the show is about a bunch of actors putting on this story. So technically I am Romeo, but I am an actor playing Romeo in this version of the show that Shakespeare and Anne are writing as it's happening, and the character of Romeo is this guy who everybody in the cast is friends with. "It's My Life" is supposed to be a celebration of, "Oh my god, our friend Liam is finally getting to go on stage as Romeo now." I'm a person who loves my friendships a lot and I love the people I get to do the show with, so that energy of, "What's up guys? You've been hanging out with me backstage for the past 50 minutes, but now I'm onstage with you," is something I've really been trying to bring into the show to keep it exciting and fun to do. It's a new aspect and a new layer.

Do you relate to the character in other ways?
He's a big lovable idiot, and I think sometimes that is how I can be portrayed. I'm down to just go along with the vibe. When Shakespeare's like, "I can get you into this wedding, you just have to pretend to be a part of this family and then do a big boy band number," I'd be like, "Hell yeah. Let's go." He's a goofball who goes with the flow, and I try to be that in my life.

What attracted you to the role and to & Juliet?
The music. The fact that my initial self-tape for this was singing "It's My Life" to sing on a Broadway stage was so exciting, because I grew up doing this after school music program called School of Rock, where you would take lessons, but also play tributes to different rock bands from the different eras. I did that from when I was nine to 16 or 17. I would go around to bars in Charlotte, North Carolina where I'm from, singing Led Zeppelin, Bon Jovi, The Rolling Stones, all of these rock bands from my parents' generation. So that's always been my favorite stuff to sing. I loved singing the musical theater pop score of How to Dance in Ohio, I love singing Les Miz, but my heart is singing rock music. That is the loudest moment in the show, the loudest cue they have on the board is my mic at the top of "It's My Life." To be able to come into the show like that, singing something that I love and to be able to access that part of my voice, which I never thought I'd be able to do on a Broadway stage, is really awesome. That's what drew me to it initially.

You talked about the softer side of Romeo, but especially in that entrance, who are you channeling? Who's on his bad boy vision board?
For me, it's those classic '70s rockers, like Robert Plant, Elton John, David Bowie, Mick Jagger. That's not how I would base a character off of him, but to get myself into that, it's like, "Okay, we're at MSG, I'm Freddie Mercury at Live Aid." It's that energy for me.

Does the spectacle of this production help you keep your energy up throughout the show?
I've been in the show for 15 months now, and I've never done anything even close to this long of a run. While I still love the story, there comes a point where you hit a certain amount of performances and you're like, "Well, okay, we're going to go in and do this again." This is the same thing that I've been doing for the past year and it's still exciting, but so much of that excitement is really built into the show with the huge moments. In our theater, we're lucky because we can see the audience so well. So to be able to actually watch kids and adults have these moments of pure joy in their seats is something that really brings energy and keeps me going at the end of the five-show weekend.

Has your pre-show routine changed now that you've been in the production for a while?
It's definitely changed a bit. I know what I need now and I think I used to do too much to get ready for the show. If it's the first show of the day, I'll vocally warm up during Act One. I go upstairs, I do a quick cross on stage during "Hit Me Baby One More Time," I go back downstairs, I have some tea, I sing for 10 minutes and then usually after that I will go upstairs and hang around, because I don't like to sit downstairs by myself. I always try to check in with whoever's playing Juliet before the show, because my entire show is with her. I like to make sure I've seen most of the people in the building before I go on stage, specifically Juliet, and I make sure I'm vocally warm, and that's really the routine for me.

Does your performance change depending on who's playing Juliet?
Yeah. They all are very different people and actors and they have different voices. I've done the show with five Juliets now. It's always exciting, and it forces you to really listen to the lines and actually be in those scenes and not just be robotic about it. Doing it with a different person, people are going to play things differently. So it's fun.

Do you have a favorite song or moment during the show?
Obviously I love singing "It's My Life," but I really think the scene leading into "One More Try," which is the duet between [Romeo and Juliet], and "One More Try" itself is so beautiful. I think David West Read, who wrote & Juliet and compiled the songs, did such an amazing job. That's my favorite scene that goes into a song in the show, and it helps that Max Martin wrote it for & Juliet. It's the only song that he wrote for the show, because he was like, "We really need a duet. Not a song that we turned into a duet, but we need a duet between these two people." So it's the cheat of our jukebox musical. But it's so beautiful, and I think it's staged so nicely with the carnival and the big moon bench that we get to fly on. There's so much stuff in the show that I don't do because I don't do Act One. I love "Show Me Love," the one where they're going to Paris. That last chorus when everybody's on stage singing and dancing together is so awesome.

How has your experience been with the & Juliet fandom?
It's fun because a lot of the people who I would consider super fans of the show, I met when they would come to How to Dance in Ohio a bunch. The thing I love the most about the people who come back over and over again is that their favorite days are the days that it's not the full company. They love to see understudies, they love to see the swings, because they love to have the different combinations of people and [see] how the show is different with different people on stage. I love seeing them in the audience over and over again. There's one person specifically who I'll watch in the audience and they're very focused, but also kind of doing the choreography with their hands. I'm like, "You know the show probably better than I do. I may know Romeo better than you, but you could do any other track better than me, and I've done the show 500 times." It's dedication that we always appreciate, and they're our best audience members. They're always so excited to see it. There's people who I know have seen it like 300 plus times, but will still cry during "Roar." That's awesome that you still find such joy and exactly what you want to find in this show.

Do you have other dream Broadway roles? There are fans who want to see you as Orpheus in Hadestown.
I want to do Hadestown. Spread it! I want to be Orpheus in Hadestown so bad. I have loved that show forever. It is the exact kind of score I love to sing. Anaïs [Mitchell] wrote the most beautiful score. It's truly one of my favorite shows. My favorite thing to see in a Broadway show is when everybody is on the same page, when all departments are telling the same exact story. And there's been so many shows—Hamilton is an incredible example of this—where they were so creative in each of their different departments, whether that be costumes, set, choreography, they're all so cohesive. Hadestown is the same way. [Director] Rachel Chavkin assembled a mega team to do that and I love it. But there's plenty of stuff I want to do. I think I'm spoiled, because the first show I did was an original musical that was so collaborative, and I've done a couple original things since then, and workshops that I would love to see take more steps forward, because I love that aspect of collaboration. And then I'd never say no to playing Fiyero.

In your experience, what are some of the benefits and challenges of originating a role versus replacing?
With replacing, it was so wild because I always want to compare myself to the people who'd done it before, and I think I've done a good job of making it my own. It also helps that me and Ben [Jackson Walker], who originated, our voices are so different and we're such different performers in general. I love Ben and he's a good friend of mine, and what he did with the role, while it's very different to what I have found, it's also awesome. That's such a cool thing about this show—like I was saying about the Juliets, everybody does it differently, and my covers do it differently as well. Originating a show, to be able to be in the room and talk about what you think is working as an actor and what makes sense specifically in a scene and being able to offer your own hand... I think it's the moment that a creative team finds something that works. It's such a cool feeling to witness moments being created for the first time. I did a workshop back in the fall of a musical about Nikola Tesla, and I was playing Nikola. It was so cool to learn about him, but also, I forget everything comes from nothing. At one point, none of this choreography, none of this music, none of these words existed. To be in the room with all of the people who did make that happen and to watch a full two-and-a-half-hour musical, even if it's just in a rehearsal space, is so cool. To be able to be a part of that from the ground floor is really, really exciting.

If you had to turn another classic story on its head, what would it be?
Oh gosh. It's tough, because there's so many that have been done, like Into the Woods. Not to bring it back to Hadestown, but I think you could make so many different musicals with Greek myths. There are so many cool stories in that realm that you could fill three seasons on Broadway with just original musicals based off of the Greek stories. Even if it's not specifically by those names, but adaptations of those are really beautiful and they all teach lessons and have such good storytelling. So I'd say dig around in there. But I love original work, and I think there's so many cool things that people can and will continue to make, and I hope to be a part of them.

Get tickets to & Juliet!