One night, the Capulet’s are holding a big party, following the announcement that a relative of the Prince, Count Paris, wishes to marry Juliet Capulet, an idea which Lady Capulet and the Nurse (Juliet’s Nurse and best friend) both like the sound of. Mercutio, the best friend of Romeo Montague, has gotten an invite to the party, and drags Romeo along, who is depressed at being told that the girl he loves doesn’t love him back. Romeo and Juliet both meet at the party, and instantly fall in love. Their families warn each lover about the other, but they agree to meet in secrecy the following day, and are soon married in secret. Romeo wants to try and make peace with Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin, but in the end a fight breaks out. Tybalt ends up killing Mercutio, so Romeo kills Tybalt in revenge, and ends up banished from Verona.
Meanwhile, Lord Capulet has announced that Count Paris can marry Juliet, but Juliet disagrees and has a big argument with her father. She visits a local friend called Friar Lawrence, who gives her a medicine, which will send her to sleep for 24 hours. Everybody will think she is dead, and she can avoid her forthcoming wedding to Count Paris. Friar Lawrence also sends a letter to Romeo explaining what is happening. Juliet “dies” and this news reaches Romeo before the letter. He rushes to Verona, closely followed by the police (he is banished). He quickly buys some poison and makes his way to the church where Juliet has been laid to rest. He sees Juliet lying there, and instantly swallows the poison, just as Juliet wakes up. Romeo realises what has happened, but it is too late, and he dies. Juliet then kills herself, and dies by Romeo’s side.
The play does still have a lot of relevance today. That are many fierce rivalries that still occur today with violent consequences, in places such as Ireland and the Middle East. There have been more modern plays and stories written along the same lines, such as “Grease” and “West Side Story.” Finally, and perhaps most importantly, thousands of people still fall in love today, despite huge problems such as parental disapproval, war and religion.
The scene I am studying is Act 1 Scene 5- the party scene where Romeo and Juliet meet. It starts off with the Capulet servants getting the party ready. Lord Capulet is playing “mine host” and in is a very good mood, as he greets the guests when they arrive. Romeo and Mercutio sneak in wearing masks and Romeo eventually meets Juliet. The pair instantly fall in love. Meanwhile, Juliet’s cousin Tybalt spots Romeo and is outraged that a Montague has appeared at the Capulet party. Tybalt want to kill Romeo, but Lord Capulet spots him, saying that he doesn’t want to cause any trouble at the party, and Romeo isn’t causing any trouble anyway. Eventually, the Nurse spots Juliet with Romeo and pulls her away to meet Count Paris. The Nurse and Lady Capulet both warn her about Romeo, and Juliet discovers that he’s a Montague. Romeo also discovers that Juliet is a Capulet.
Act 1 Scene 5 of “Romeo and Juliet” is dramatically effective in many different ways. Firstly, it is one of the most tension-filled scenes in the whole play. The scene starts off with the Capulet servants rushing around a preparing for the party dance:
“Where’s Potpan, that he helps not to take away? He shift a trencher? He scrape a trencher?”
This hustle and bustle starts the scene off with tension straight away, as well as with a bit of excitement and anticipation, which means that the audience are flung straight into the heat of the party action. This feature alone helps to set the scene for something much bigger to happen later- which it does.
The early tension briefly dies down for a few minutes, whilst we see the cheerful and jolly Capulet welcoming the guests to the party, which provides an excellent contrast to the fiery and dangerous Tybalt. But when Tybalt later recognises Romeo at the party, his temper is instantly ignited. He then goes onto have a huge argument with the calm Capulet, about Romeo’s presence:
“I’ll not endure him”
“He shall be endured!”
This conflict and hatred of Tybalt’s is laid to rest for the time being, but the audience know that it will soon spark up again, which helps to keep them on the edge of their seats, and helps to build the tension up again.
The language used by the characters also plays a key role in making the scene dramatically effective. As previously said the scene starts off with the Capulet servants rushing around preparing for the party. Their language use informs us of how both excited and nervous they are:
“Cheerly boys; be brisk a while”
This helps to set the important atmosphere for the scene. The scene then goes onto the argument between Capulet and Tybalt. This fiery and explosive language contradicts the jolly and excitable language set at the beginning of the scene. Of course though, the majority of the language in the scene is of a romantic nature, spoken between Romeo and Juliet:
“To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss”
This sudden change in language softens the atmosphere again, and dampens the long-standing tension again. It makes the scene dramatically effective because Romeo and Juliet meet for the first time, and their language indicates how deeply they have fallen in love.
Also dotted briefly around the scene is the use of humour:
“Ladies that have their toes unplagued with corns will walk a bout with you”
This helps to make the scene dramatically effective, as the audience are likely to maintain their attention upon the scene if they can have a laugh whilst being entertained. The characters themselves help to play a key role in this humour, as it is their personalities that have to interact on stage, tell the story and try to keep the audiences attention. Capulet’s jolly nature works well in conjunction with his determination to have a smooth run party:
“Be quiet or-”
[To the Servants] “More light, more light, for shame! -”
[To Tybalt] “I’ll make you quiet-”
[To the Dancers] “What, cheerly, my hearts!”
Something else that helps to make the scene dramatically effective, is the rollercoaster of emotions, which runs alongside the plot (which in a way, only truly starts in this scene). The emotions start off on a high with the excitement of the servants setting up the party. They then die down briefly, until the argument between Tybalt and Capulet, in which they immediately flare up again at full strength. After briefly dying down once more, they start up again, with the romance between Romeo and Juliet:
“And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss”
“Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?”
These emotions run parallelly with all of the action; the fact that there always seem to be something going on the scene, which helps to keep the audiences’ attention and helps to make the scene dramatically effective.
Lastly, the scene contains all of the major themes, which feature in the play. The Love and Romance comes from Romeo and Juliet’s encounter:
“You kiss by the book”
The Conflict comes from the argument between Tybalt and Capulet, which is also where the hatred comes from (Tybalt’s hatred for Romeo):
“‘Tis he, that villain, Romeo”
In conclusion, Shakespeare makes Act 1 Scene 5 dramatically effective by using various methods to grab and keep the attention of the audience. He uses tension, the characters, the language, emotions, action, humour and all of the major themes from the play in this one scene, to his advantage.
Act 1 Scene 5 is very important to the whole play for many reasons. It is obviously important because it is the scene when Romeo and Juliet first meet and proclaim their love for each over:
“If I profane with my unworthiest hand…”
Since the whole play is based around these two and their forbidden love, their meeting and declaration of love in this scene is very important to the play, as it leads to their marriage, and even helps to set out the rest of the play. It also leads onto the adding tension between Romeo and Tybalt:
“To strike him dead. I hold it not a sin”
This hatred between the two eventually results in Tybalt’s death and Romeo’s banishment from Verona. Since this hatred for an individual Montague, rather than Montague’s as a whole starts off in this scene, it makes the scene even more important to the overall play, and it may be thought that it is this scene which starts off the story and plot of the whole play. This scene “sets the scene” for the later drama in Act 3 Scene 1:
“I will withdraw, but this intrusion shall, Now seeming sweet, convert to bitterest gall”
This scene also establishes just how big the hatred is between the two families, which is soon contrasted when they call a truce at the end of the play. The audience of course is completely hooked during the whole play as to what will happen, especially in this scene. They start to wonder will what happen, and can’t bear to miss a moment, especially with the ever growing tension. This scene in particular helps to spark off a lot of questions in the audiences’ mind. The biggest one, would probably be “Will Romeo and Juliet get caught?” They realise how different the play could have been if this scene was not included. Juliet might have ended up marrying Count Paris, Romeo might have continued to brood over his “old flame” Rosaline and most importantly, Romeo and Juliet might not have killed themselves. Is not of these things had happened, the play would have been very different, which proves just how important Act 1 Scene 5 really is the play.
In conclusion, Act 1 Scene 5 is very important to the play as a whole. The whole plot of the play seems to revolve and grow from around what happens in this scene, with the most noticeable being the meeting of the two main characters: Romeo and Juliet. The scene is very balanced, so that the tension and drama does not take over the scene completely, which would probably be very boring to the audience. Instead, they get the humour, tension, drama and romance all in a perfect balance, which is what Shakespeare has done so well at, in “Romeo and Juliet.”
