Theater

Orlando Bloom heats up the stage in ‘Romeo and Juliet’

There hasn’t been this much talk about chemistry since the start of “Breaking Bad” — but what better way to measure our Romeos and Juliets?

This fall, we’re getting three pairs — the buzziest of them on Broadway, where “Romeo and Juliet,” starring Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad, opens Thursday.

Since previews started last month, multitudes have milled ’round the Richard Rodgers stage door for a peek at the “Pirates of the Caribbean” pinup after each show, snarling traffic on West 46th Street.

So it’s startling to find Bloom himself, two hours before a performance, standing in the orchestra section, kissing an usher’s hand.

“That was Fran,” he says, settling into a seat. “She’s been in this theater for 28 years! I come onstage to warm up before each show and she’s always there — she was there the first night. So I looked out and said, ‘Hello, what’s your name?’ . . .

“So Fran [Eppy] is a little bit of a good omen,” he continues, “and she was just showing me a news clipping about an actor who’s just done something to his face. She said, ‘Promise me you will never do anything to your face,’ [and I said], ‘Don’t worry about that, honey.’ She’s wonderful. It’s nice to know the people you work with!”

And it’s nice to sit beside Bloom — a curly lock of dark hair falling across his forehead — even though it means juggling notebook, pen and tape recorder. He understands, and, taking the recorder, balances it on one slim, black-jeaned thigh. (O, were I that tape recorder . . . )

It is, the 36-year-old says softly, his First Time.

“This is my first Broadway, my first Romeo, my first time with Shakespeare,” he says. “My mother said to me, ‘You realize you’re climbing Everest for your first time out of the gate.’ And I was, ‘Well, if I’m not terrified, what’s the point?’ ”

Orlando Bloom makes his Broadway debut in “Romeo and Juliet” with co-star Condola Rashad.

Surely this can’t be Bloom’s first Shakespeare. Britain probably doesn’t release its actors into the wild without their performing at least a bit of the Bard.

Bloom smiles and takes a sip from his thermos. Indeed, he says, he did five nights as Romeo with the Los Angeles Philharmonic three years ago, though he and his Juliet (Anika Noni Rose) performed only the balcony and tomb bits.

Before that, in London’s Guildhall School of Drama, Bloom was set to play Orsino in “Twelfth Night” but broke his back. As soon as he recovered, his career changed course.

“I got cast in ‘Lord of the Rings,’ ” he says, “and was in movies for 10 years straight.”

What’s his take on the world’s greatest romantic?

“You have to see it,” Bloom replies. “In a nutshell, Romeo is open and giving, and if I ever think I can give more, then I haven’t given enough . . . I think people get lost in the despair. But the lovers burn so bright, they blaze, because they joy in the moments they share.”

While he didn’t pick his Juliet, he says Rashad was destined to be the one. “I did some chemistry reads with a few people, but Condola really took the part,” he says. “She was the part, she is the part. She came into the audition and gave a reading and I cracked up . . . it was so charming and funny! I went to see her in ‘The Trip to Bountiful’ and she’s just luminous. She lights up the stage.”

So charged is their chemistry together — director David Leveaux has called it “electrifying” — that there’s been talk that, well . . . maybe Miranda Kerr has something to worry about?

“Oh,” Bloom says, flatly. “Rumors that I’m going to leave my wife for Condola? Yeah, that’s not happening.”

Orlando Bloom signs autographs for adoring fans at the “Romeo and Juliet” premiere performance.FilmMagic

In her dressing room the other day, Rashad laughs at the thought.

“If that’s a rumor people want to spread and it draws people to the show, then go ahead and spread it, because it’s not true,” says the willowy 26-year-old, who grew up in Westchester and behind the scenes at “The Cosby Show,” starring her mother, Phylicia.

“I just saw Miranda and she knows I’m nothing if not respectful,” Rashad says. “And I have a boyfriend” — a former model she won’t name.

For now, she’s focusing on being Juliet, a role she calls “epic,” though that’s not how Rashad’s playing it.

“Juliet is the most open girl ever,” she says. “She doesn’t think she’s special. That’s why she loves Romeo so much, because he makes her feel special . . .

“The funny thing is, I totally had a huge crush on Orlando Bloom when I was 14” — Juliet’s age. “Now I have the same love for him, but I know him so it’s not, like, so AHHH!

“There are certain actors that might have relied on celebrity and good looks, but he’s got both and he doesn’t rely on either one. He works! And of course . . .” She leans back on a cushion and lets out a soft scream, “He’s GOR-GEOUS!”