Consider how Shakespeare crafts Act 3 Scene 5 to appeal to the audience
In the events leading up to Act 3 Scene 5, Romeo has been banished and so is spending a final night with Juliet. Furthermore the audience has just learnt that Lord Capulet has agreed to let Paris marry Juliet on Thursday. This leaves the audience worried for not only Romeo's safety but also Juliet as her father is starting to show signs of anger. Knowing this makes the audience tense; this is good as Act 3 Scene 5 can (in a stage performance) go at the beginning of the second half. This means the audience is in suspense over the interval; they know there is a conflict coming, perhaps even involving violence.
Having just left a scene showing anger, Shakespeare cuts straight to Romeo and Juliet together. This more romantic atmosphere has an opposite affect on the audience conjuring more tension; the audience wants to know what is going to happen to Juliet between her parents. Cutting from anger to happiness comes about again during the scene. A countdown to the climax has begun, the audience is impatient as they anticipate its coming.
When Romeo and Juliet are in bed together they finish off each other's lines with rhyming couplets.
"ROMEO: I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
JULIET: Yon light is not daylight, I know it, I." (11-12)
This composes harmony; in contrast these rhyming couplets only come when they are talking of leaving. This togetherness and separation go well together questioning the audience to whether Romeo and Juliet are a perfect couple? It certainly makes the audience think.
Just after line 36 the Nurse enters "hastily". Shakespeare uses few stage directions in his plays so on occasions when he does it is to be noted. The Nurse's rushed entrance can either bring danger or there is a comic potential (or perhaps both). The Nurse already knows of Romeo and Juliet's marriage but may not be prepared for what she might find. Mixed together, the tension of the forthcoming dispute and this comical happening it creates a good cliffhanger.
In the events leading up to Act 3 Scene 5, Romeo has been banished and so is spending a final night with Juliet. Furthermore the audience has just learnt that Lord Capulet has agreed to let Paris marry Juliet on Thursday. This leaves the audience worried for not only Romeo's safety but also Juliet as her father is starting to show signs of anger. Knowing this makes the audience tense; this is good as Act 3 Scene 5 can (in a stage performance) go at the beginning of the second half. This means the audience is in suspense over the interval; they know there is a conflict coming, perhaps even involving violence.
Having just left a scene showing anger, Shakespeare cuts straight to Romeo and Juliet together. This more romantic atmosphere has an opposite affect on the audience conjuring more tension; the audience wants to know what is going to happen to Juliet between her parents. Cutting from anger to happiness comes about again during the scene. A countdown to the climax has begun, the audience is impatient as they anticipate its coming.
When Romeo and Juliet are in bed together they finish off each other's lines with rhyming couplets.
"ROMEO: I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
JULIET: Yon light is not daylight, I know it, I." (11-12)
This composes harmony; in contrast these rhyming couplets only come when they are talking of leaving. This togetherness and separation go well together questioning the audience to whether Romeo and Juliet are a perfect couple? It certainly makes the audience think.
Just after line 36 the Nurse enters "hastily". Shakespeare uses few stage directions in his plays so on occasions when he does it is to be noted. The Nurse's rushed entrance can either bring danger or there is a comic potential (or perhaps both). The Nurse already knows of Romeo and Juliet's marriage but may not be prepared for what she might find. Mixed together, the tension of the forthcoming dispute and this comical happening it creates a good cliffhanger.