In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet the tragic and dramatic elements of the play are balanced by the comic relief dispersed through Act 1 via sexual puns, the nurse’s dialogue, and Mercutio ridiculing Romeo’s idea of true love. Shakespeare uses sexual puns all throughout act 1 in his drama. He includes it in the beginning of the play when Sampson talks to Gregory about about “cutting off the maids heads” and when the nurse supplies the memory of young Juliet saying she will fall on her back when Juliet gets older. The scene with Gregory and Sampson provides comic relief since the serving men of both sides of the feuding families are going to fight. “Tis all one. I will show myself a tyrant. When I have fought with the men, I will be civil with
