MERCUTIO

Where the devil is Romeo? Did he come home last night?

BENVOLIO

Not to his father’s house. I asked Romeo’s servant.

MERCUTIO

Rosaline—that pale-skinned, hard-hearted wench—torments him so much that he’s going to go insane.

BENVOLIO

Tybalt, old Capulet’s kinsman, has sent a letter to Romeo’s father’s house.

MERCUTIO

I bet it’s a challenge to fight.

BENVOLIO

Romeo will answer it.

MERCUTIO

Any man who can write is able to answer a letter.

BENVOLIO

No, Romeo will respond to the letter writer and accept the challenge.

MERCUTIO

Poor Romeo! He is already dead: stabbed by the black eye of a fair-skinned girl, cut through the ear by a love song. The very core of his heart has been split by blind Cupid’s arrow. Is he really man enough to fight Tybalt?

BENVOLIO

Why, what’s up with Tybalt?

MERCUTIO

He’s more than just the Prince of Cats. Oh, he does everything according to convention. He fights like you sing printed music, carefully keeping the correct time, distance, and rhythm. He rests when it is proper to rest: one, two, and the third in your heart. He’s a master duelist who can hit any of his opponent’s buttons that he chooses. He’s a gentleman who learned at the finest fencing school, and he’s skilled at identifying insults and slights to his honor so that he’s “forced” to fight. He knows the passado—the forward thrust—the punto reverso—the backhand thrust—and the hai—the thrust for the heart.

BENVOLIO

He knows what?

MERCUTIO

A curse on these wild, pompous fellows who are always spouting exotic foreign phrases. These fellows, who say things like: “By Jesus, this is a very good blade! A very brave man! A very good whore.” Isn’t it a sad thing, good man, that we are forced to interact with these foreign flies, these fashionmongers, these fellows who say “pardon me” and care so deeply about good manners that they can’t relax on a bench without groaning, “Oh, my aching bones!”

BENVOLIO

Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo.

MERCUTIO

He looks skinny as a dried herring without its eggs. O flesh, flesh, you’ve turned pale as a fish. Now he’s just like Petrarch’s hopeless love poetry. In Romeo’s opinion, compared to his own lady love: Petrarch’s Laura was like a kitchen slave—though Laura clearly had a lover who was better at making rhymes; Dido was drab and dull; Cleopatra was a gypsy girl; Helen and Hero were good-for-nothing harlots; Thisbe might have had beautiful eyes, but that doesn’t matter. 

[To ROMEO] Signor Romeo, bonjour. There’s a French greeting to match the loose high-fashion French pants you’re wearing. You tricked us pretty well last night.

ROMEO

Good morning to you both. What do you mean I tricked you?

MERCUTIO

You gave us the slip, sir, the slip. Do you understand me now?

ROMEO

I’m sorry, good Mercutio. My business was so important that I must be forgiven for stretching good manners and courtesy.

MERCUTIO

So what you’re saying is that your “business” forced you to flex your legs.

ROMEO

Meaning make a curtsy?

MERCUTIO

Now you’ve “hit it.”

ROMEO

What a courteous explanation.

MERCUTIO

Indeed, I am the very “pink” of courtesy.

ROMEO

As in the pink flower.

MERCUTIO

Right.

ROMEO

Well, then my pump is covered in flowers.

MERCUTIO

Ah, witty Romeo, now you’ve taken this joke so far that it’s worn out your pump. With the sole of your pump now worn away, the joke is all that remains.

ROMEO

This jest has such a thin sole, and is unique only because of its lameness.

MERCUTIO

Please break up this war of words, Benvolio. My wits can’t keep up.

ROMEO

Continue, continue, or I’ll proclaim victory.

MERCUTIO

No, if our witticisms go on a wild-goose chase, I’m done for. You have more wild goose in one of your jokes than I have in five of mine. Was I  even close to you in our goose chase?

ROMEO

You would not have been with me for anything if you weren’t there for the goose.

MERCUTIO

I’ll bite you on the ear for that joke.

ROMEO

No, good goose, don’t bite me.

MERCUTIO

Your wit is a bitter apple. It is a very spicy sauce.

ROMEO

Isn’t that the perfect sauce for a sweet goose?

MERCUTIO

Oh, that joke is made of leather so thin it has been stretched from an inch wide to a full fat yard.

ROMEO

I stretched it for that word “fat.” Add that to the goose, and it makes you a fat goose.

MERCUTIO

Now, isn’t this jesting better than groaning about love? Now you’re being sociable. Now you’re Romeo. Now you are what you truly are, both naturally and through education. In contrast, this love of yours made you like some fool who runs all over the place looking for a hole in which to hide his precious trinket.

BENVOLIO

Stop there, stop there.

MERCUTIO

You’re asking me to stop my tale before it’s finished.

BENVOLIO

Continuing on would have made your tale too long.

MERCUTIO

You’re wrong there. I would have made it short. I had come to the full depth of my tale, and intended to say nothing more about it.

ROMEO

Now here’s something.

BENVOLIO

A sail, a sail!

MERCUTIO

No, two sails—a man in a shirt and a woman in a dress.

NURSE

Peter!

PETER

In a moment.

NURSE

Give me my fan, Peter.

MERCUTIO

Good Peter, to hide her face, please give her the fan. Her fan is prettier than her face.

NURSE

Good morning, gentlemen.

MERCUTIO

Good afternoon, beautiful lady.

NURSE

Is it afternoon?

MERCUTIO

It’s not any earlier, I tell you. The lusty hand of the clock is now upon the prick of noon.

NURSE

Get out of town! What kind of man are you?

MERCUTIO

A man, good lady, whom God has made for himself to ruin.

NURSE

I swear, that seems the truth. “For himself to ruin,” he says. Gentlemen, can any of you tell me where I can find young Romeo?

ROMEO

I can tell you, but young Romeo will be older when you have found him than he was when you began to look for him. I am the youngest man by that name, because there is none younger or worse.

NURSE

You speak well.

MERCUTIO

Is the worst well? Very well taken, in truth, very wise.

NURSE

If you’re Romeo, sir, I would like to have a private conversation with you.

BENVOLIO

She will invite him to dinner.

MERCUTIO

A pimp! A pimp! A pimp! That’s it!

ROMEO

What have you discovered?

MERCUTIO

Well, she can’t be a prostitute unless she’s so stale and old that she’s only tasted when nothing else is available.
[He sings]
Old rabbit meat
Old rabbit meat
Is good meat if you can’t get anything else,
But old moldy rabbit,
Is a waste of your coin
If it goes moldy before you can eat it
[He speaks] Romeo, are you going to your father’s? We’re having lunch there. Let’s go.

ROMEO

I’ll follow after you.

MERCUTIO

Farewell, old lady. Farewell, lady, lady, lady.

NURSE

Please tell me, sir, who was that foulmouthed fellow with all his dirty jokes?

ROMEO

Nurse, he’s a gentleman who loves to hear himself talk. He says more in one minute than he will stand behind in a month.

NURSE

If he says anything against me, I’ll teach him a lesson, even if he were tougher than he is—and twenty wise-asses like him. And if I couldn’t take him down myself, I’ll find someone who can. That rotten scoundrel! I’m not one of his flirty girls. I’m not one of his low-life scheming friends. 

[To PETER] And you just stand aside, letting every fool make fun of me for pleasure?

PETER

I didn’t see anybody use you for pleasure. If I had, I’d have quickly pulled out my weapon, I assure you. I draw my sword as quickly as any other man if I see a good fight brewing and the law is on my side.

NURSE

Now, by God, I’m so upset that I’m shaking. That rotten scoundrel! 

[To ROMEO] Now, good sir, may I speak with you? My young mistress sent me to find you. What she told me to say, I will keep to myself. But first let me say: if you lead her into a fool’s paradise, as they say, it would be extremely indecent behavior, as they say. For the girl is young. So if you should deceive her, it would be an awful thing to do to any woman, and very poor manners.

ROMEO

Nurse, speak well of me to your mistress. I pledge to you—

NURSE

Your heart is good, and I promise, I will tell her that. Lord, Lord, she will be a joyful woman.

ROMEO

What are you going to tell her, Nurse? You’re not understanding me.

NURSE

I will tell her, sir, that you protest to her, which I think is a gentlemanly offer.  

ROMEO

Tell her to devise a way to come to confession this afternoon. And there, at Friar Lawrence’s cell, she can make confession and we will be married. [Holding out some money to the NURSE] Here is a reward for your efforts.

NURSE

No, truly, sir. I won’t take your money.

ROMEO

Go on, I insist.

NURSE

[Taking the money] This afternoon, sir? She will be there.

ROMEO

Just a moment, good Nurse. In an hour, behind the abbey wall, one of my servants will meet you and give you a rope ladder. I’ll then use the ladder to secretly climb up to Juliet’s room tonight. Farewell. Be worthy of my trust, and I’ll repay you for your help. Farewell. Speak well of me to your mistress.

NURSE

May God in heaven bless you! Now listen, sir.

ROMEO

What, my dear Nurse?

NURSE

Can your servant be trusted? Have you ever heard the saying, “Two men may keep a secret, but only if one is far away?"

ROMEO

I guarantee you that my man is as trustworthy as steel.

NURSE

Well, sir, my mistress is the sweetest lady. Lord, Lord, when she was a little baby—Oh, there is one nobleman in the city, Paris, who would gladly lay claim to her. But Juliet, good soul that she is, would rather be with a toad, a toad, than him. Sometimes I make her angry by telling her that Paris is better looking than you. I swear to you, when I say that she turns as white as any sheet in the entire world. Don’t “rosemary” and “Romeo” begin with the same letter?

ROMEO

Yes, Nurse, what about that? Both begin with an  “R.”

NURSE

Ah, you jokester—that’s the dog’s name. “R” is for the—no, I know that word begins with another letter. She says such pretty things about you and rosemary that it would do you good to hear them.

ROMEO

Speak well of me to your lady.

NURSE

Yes, a thousand times. Peter!

PETER

I’m ready.

NURSE

[Giving her fan to PETER] Go ahead of me, and go quickly.