The closing scene in Act 1 is set in the living room, to add to the feeling that this is a domestic situation. It also adds plausibility to the scene, the setting making it seem more believable and realistic. Alfieri's opening speech also refers to the ordinariness surrounding this situation, "This one's name was Eddie Carbone," suggesting that this was no freak occurrence, the events described taking place more often than people would like to admit.

The scene is made dramatically effective by many different techniques. As this is

Eddie and Beatrice seem like any other loving, happily married couple, in contrast there are definite signs of conflict. When discussing Catherine's job Eddie asks Beatrice "what you mad at me lately?" to which she replies, "who's mad. I'm not mad. You're the one who's mad" indicating something is not right there. This feeling is echoed in Act 2, when Beatrice says, "I'm no different," which suggests blame for the slow (ongoing) degeneration of their marriage rests squarely on the shoulders of her husband, as indicated in the "mad" statement.

Another point which shows the possible strain in their marriage, is during the boxing match, she can only see the positive side (the stage directions even indicating so- "she senses only the comradeship"), "he's teaching him, he's very good." This perhaps hints that Beatrice is not really attuned to the way Eddie acts and thinks, therefore she is not quite as close as perhaps she should be. This is in total contrast to the way Catherine says she knows Eddie and can anticipate his every move.

Firstly a lot of tension is evident in the atmosphere when Catherine asks Rodolfo to dance. This gives us a powerful insight into Catherine's true feelings as we know she desperately does not want to anger Eddie or hurt his feelings, however we can now see that she knows that as a woman, she must put her own feeling to the fore. We can see she obviously feels very strongly for Rodolfo, she is willing to go against Eddie. Catherine becomes far sterner towards the end of Act 1, where she directly goes against Eddie by asking Rodolfo to dance. Her actions seem to be a show of strength gesture, indicating she is not a little girl any more (no matter how much Eddie wishes this was the case). Whilst the two are dancing, Eddie continues to make snide comments about Rodolfo's effeminate nature, "he sings, he cooks, he could make dresses..." The tension rises as Eddie continues to mock Rodolfo, leading to everyone focusing their attention on him, prompting the stage directions "he has unconsciously been twisting the paper into a tight roll." This suggests he is feeling the 'glare' from the others as he exposes the sensitive subject.

As well as language being important throughout the final scene, the syntax also plays a part in adding to the effectiveness of the scene. For instance, near the end of Act 1, when Marco begins to sense Eddie's slightly odd actions towards his brother, his replies to Eddie's questions are always described as "cautious" or "uneasily." This could be represented by Marco pausing before he says each of these lines, suggesting to the audience that he is pondering what Eddie is scheming. Also the pace of the sentences increases during the boxing match. This is appropriate, as the scene becomes more exciting and tense during this dramatic event. The length of sentence is affected, becoming shorter during the bout, as the shortened length indicates the excitement of the scene.

Marco's relationship with Eddie s often a very good barometer to how tense the play is at that particular time. The beginning sees everyone seemingly happy and contented in their lives (Marco is liked by Eddie as he is a strong, focused, hard worker). More strain is put on the relationship before the climax of the end of Act 1, as the chair-lifting contest appears to be a reply to Eddie that no one should mess with the brothers. We can see Marco is slightly suspicious about Eddie and his motives (especially about boxing match-seems to notice intent in Eddie's blows) and also the stage direction reflect this, when Marco replies to Eddie it is "cautiously," and also when "Marco nods dubiously." There is an incredible amount of tension during the chair lifting. As throughout Act 1, the situation is mirrored in the concluding Act, just on a more serious scale, the tension rises until the cousins have been picked up by the Immigration Bureau, and finally Marco kills Eddie in revenge for being an informant.

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Some common words found in the essay are:
Eddie Rodolfo, Eddie Marco, Eddie Catherine, Act Marco, Immigration Bureau, Initially Eddie, Catherine Rodolfo, Beatrice I'm, Act Alfieri, Rodolfo Eddie, act 1, stage directions, boxing match, eddie rodolfo, act 2, alfieri's speech, throughout play, tension audience, rodolfo dance, immigration bureau, visual actions characters, events act 1, catherine rodolfo dance, act 1 marco, near act 1,
Approximate Word count = 2794
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)