GRAMMY Museum’s & Juliet: The Music of Max Martin and Friends Exhibit Brings Broadway Pop Hits to LA
LOS ANGELES, CA- The GRAMMY Museum is currently showcasing a pop-up exhibit, & Juliet: The Music of Max Martin and Friends, in conjunction with the upcoming Southern California runs of the stage musical as it carries out a national tour. As someone who is a huge fan of both pop music and Broadway, I spent the morning excitedly poking around the various corners of the exhibit and wandering off to examine all the other displays in the museum. I’d somehow never managed to be in the neighborhood during their opening hours before, and it was a great opportunity to learn more about what they have on offer.
For pop music fans, mega-producer and songwriter Max Martin is one of the biggest names in the industry, from the late 90s to today. Martin is the mastermind behind monster hits ranging from Britney Spears’ “…Baby One More Time” to The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face.” The stage musical incorporates many of these songs and asks the question: what if (spoiler!) Juliet hadn’t died in Shakespeare’s play? What would her life look like, and how would she move on? The museum then traces the process of the creation of the show, from Martin’s pop history to the Broadway run. While the Shakespeare element makes it sound serious, the soundtrack is bright and fun.
The main section of the small GRAMMY Museum exhibit features props, photos, and costumes from the Broadway show. As is befitting for a performance full of pop anthems, everything on display is vivid, bright, and sparkly. It’s important to emphasize that the items are primarily from the Broadway musical, not from the original pop star performers of the songs. It opens with a few of Britney’s stage outfits (flanking the entry to the 4th floor portion of the exhibit), but if you are looking for a lot of her artifacts, this is not the place for that. I walked in behind a few huge Britney stans who seemed kind of confused that it was not focused more on her, so make sure to keep your expectations set to the right elements: more current Broadway and less 90s pop princess.
The museum also has an array of spectacular outfits nearby, especially from performers at the Latin GRAMMY Awards, and a collection of Michael Jackson’s stage attire. The displays are surrounded by cool artifacts, such as Dr. Dre’s mixing board, so you need to give yourself time to be distracted by all the history around you as you move through the building. I kept wandering off on side quests since I had not seen the museum before, and I had to go back to the beginning and walk through it all again at the end to get a clearer picture.
In a particularly meta section of the exhibit, there are photos and signed lyric sheets from NSYNC’s Joey Fatone, who rose to fame singing Martin’s songs in his own group and then performed Backstreet Boys tunes during his run in the musical on Broadway.
There is also another portion of the exhibit (on the 2nd floor) that merges the music from the show with the concept of sound mixing. In a room filled with brightly colored light-up tubes, visitors can raise and lower the various elements of the songs to create their own new mixes. Surrounded by the pink and yellow tubes, you hear the sounds rising and falling all around you as you immerse yourself in the music. Word to the wise: you have to actually run your hands along the tubes to make this part of the exhibit work. I was fruitlessly waving my hands around because I thought it was operated by sensors, only to have another guest helpfully point out that you have to touch them. Not my finest moment, but it was fun once I figured it out.
Overall, I found myself wanting more after the visit and am looking forward to seeing the musical when it opens soon at the Ahmanson. Ultimately, my main takeaway was that I had gone about this visit in the wrong order. If possible, see the show first and then go to the museum. That way, you will make the most of the experience. I am smack in the middle of the Venn diagram for their target audience, as a huge fan of Broadway, museums, and pop music, and I wanted to love the exhibit. The soundtrack for & Juliet consists of mega-hit after mega-hit, and everyone knows all the lyrics, but I did not have the context to understand what I was looking at. The costumes are fun, but I did not know the characters and needed more background info.
As I look at my calendar, I am looking not only at a date to see the performance but also for a chance to come back to see the exhibit again afterwards so I can understand it better. The YouTube algorithm knows my taste and has been bombarding me with ads for the show, and I am looking forward to a night of bopping along to Max Martin’s pop tunes at the theater.
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Just a stone’s throw from where many of music’s biggest stars perform, the GRAMMY Museum is tucked away in a corner of LA Live. It’s closed Tuesdays, and the Max Martin / & Juliet exhibit runs through October 27. Performances of & Juliet will be at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles (8/13-9/7), immediately followed by additional dates at the Segerstrom Center in Orange County (9/9-9/21).
GRAMMY Museum exhibit info link:
https://grammymuseum.org/exhibit/juliet-the-music-of-max-martin-and-friends/
Ahmanson performances link:
https://www.centertheatregroup.org/shows-tickets/ahmanson/2025-26/juliet/
Segerstrom performances link:
https://www.scfta.org/events/2025/juliet
