Romeo and Juliet and he climbs the balcony with the help of his servant, Julia and the nurse (the servants discreetly withdraw after this). Nevertheless, in October 2014, Lois Leveen speculated in "The Atlantic" that the original Shakespeare play did not contain a balcony. The word, "balcone", did not exist in the English language until two years after Shakespeare's death. The balcony was certainly used in Thomas Otway's 1679 play, "The History and Fall of Caius Marius", which had borrowed much of its story from "Romeo and Juliet" and placed the two lovers in a balcony reciting a speech similar to that between
Romeo and Juliet Betterton Mercutio, and Betterton's wife Mary Saunderson Juliet: she was probably the first woman to play the role professionally. Another version closely followed Davenant's adaptation and was also regularly performed by the Duke's Company. This was a tragicomedy by James Howard, in which the two lovers survive. Thomas Otway's "The History and Fall of Caius Marius", one of the more extreme of the Restoration adaptations of Shakespeare, debuted in 1680. The scene is shifted from Renaissance Verona to ancient Rome; Romeo is Marius, Juliet is Lavinia, the feud is between patricians and plebeians; Juliet/Lavinia wakes from her potion before Romeo/Marius