Mercutio clearly having his back (why wouldn’t he, of course) allows him to calm down some, but he’s still not about to actually answer that question. He meets Mercutio’s eyes for the briefest moment, gratitude mixed with the question of he’s alright to mess with, right?, before he finally replies to Claudius with, “How terrible for all of the fair-haired athletes and brunette artists of the world, that they should not be offered the same opportunity for adoration, by your standards. To say nothing of those lacking hair altogether.”