The Globe was buzzing; stirring with expectancy for the night's production of Othello. Sold out, this show was one highly discussed within the Shakespeare community of London due to the inclusion of Mark Rylance, a very popular Shakespearean actor to play Iago- possibly the greatest villain of Shakespeare's writing. Performed in the traditional style of Shakespeare's beloved Globe theatre, Othello was likely performed at an indoor theatre for one of its first shows. While it is speculated whether it could have been staged at the Globe at an earlier time, the first recorded performance of Othello was at the Banqueting House at Whitehall in 1604. Seeing that the Banqueting Hall is an indoor theatre, it is clear that this show attracted enough public attention for it to be staged multiple ways. Within the same time period, it was also being performed at the similarly exclusive, Black Friars theatre.
As the performance began and Rylance entered center stage, the crowd erupted in a welcoming cheer. They really do love that man. However, for playing a truly cynical character, he looked nothing like I expected. Short in stature and a kind, approachable face, this would soon make his character that much more deceiving. Something that was clearly noticeable within the first five minutes of the show was the number of actors of color. Traditionally, Othello is the only black man in the play, let alone the only person of color at all since that is such a distinguishing factor within the play. However, three other black men, and a black woman played important roles within the production, making it evident that race would become a distinct theme surrounding this interpretation of the play.
The two most strategic characters to be played by actors of color, were Cassio and Emilia, the best friend of Othello and wife of Iago. Playing Emilia, Shelia Atim was a commanding actress onstage with strong character portrayal. Emilia views men as useless and consistently dismisses the mistakes made by them. However, despite her love-lacking relationship with her husband, she still does his bidding and retrieves Desdemona's handkerchief when she drops it to give to Iago in order for him to carry out his scheming plans. Emilia had no alleged knowledge of Iago's plans, but she chose to help him. By the way, the actress delivered the lines during this scene between Iago and Emilia, it appeared as though she wanted to prove herself to Iago and maintain her pride; that she was capable and clever, even as a woman who he often belittles. Upon delivering the line in Act Three, "No (faith), she let it drop be negligence, and to th' advantage I, being here, took t' up. Look here tis'," she waved the handkerchief at him as to entice a reaction. This made her character come across as a lot less submissive to me like she seemed in the text, and more self-assured... just with an unfortunate husband.
My interpretation, whether it is correct or not, would be that because Othello is not the only character of color in this version of the production, it is emphasizing that Iago is not selective or racist in his evils. He's just outright evil and deceptive to all with no discrimination. The fact that Cassio and Emilia are also actors of color clarifies this point, I believe. Rylance portrayed Iago as so convincingly caring and loyal towards the other characters that for a while I almost wanted to like him! Knowing all of the horrible plots he would ensue, it made his manipulative conversational skills more prominent. To me, this is credited to the brilliance of casting Rylance as Iago. Not only because he is an excellent Shakespearean actor, but also because of his demeanor; a seemingly welcoming looking fella.
Two characters who left me slightly disappointed were that of Desdemona and Othello himself. While both actors were still quite good, the portrayals were not what I imagined. Jessica Warbeck rightfully played Desdemona as a loving wife, but seemingly more passive than I thought her to be in the text. She was adoring of her husband and his achievements, which confused me somewhat considering that Othello fell in love with her because she did not treat him like a hero, as everyone else did, but pitied him. I still have no idea why Othello kills her. And I'll be honest about my confusion too since I was hoping that seeing it performed live would shed some light on the reasoning. Yet, I still have none considering how flirty Desdemona and Othello's interactions always were with each other. There was a particularly dramatic part of the written play where Othello is so distraught that he experiences some sort of epileptic shock. However, on stage, Andre Holland performed this like a panic attack. It was sort of underwhelming and I had trouble recognizing it for what it was meant to be at first. Othello was displayed as a man already so hopelessly heartbroken that he chooses to believe the lies surrounding him.
In a rather emotional display, Othello is staged to strangle Desdemona with his bare hands instead of smothering her with a pillow. This made the scene more disturbing to watch, as Othello sobbed while he chocked her to death and Desdemona showed an intense struggle and plead for release. It made her death more intimate. I viewed this as an interesting contrast to Iago's murder of Rodrigo where he quickly, unfeelingly snaps his neck. The noise of his neck snapping sounded so real that I genuinely was concerned for the actor, Steffan Donnelly. I also particularly enjoyed Donnelly's job as Rodrigo, making him a funnier, more goofy, clumsy character than he sometimes came across in the text (which was kind of like Desdemona's stalker).
A death that I was disappointed in, however, was Emilia's. In the written play, she is stabbed to death by Iago but during this performance, she was shot. There could be some technical explanations for this(not wanting to use fake blood on stage or show the graphic nature of stabbing someone multiple times). But I felt her death was too quick! Not enough justice for Emilia with an emotional death. Was this in order to further emphasize Iago's numb nature? His lack of sympathy for anyone, even his wife?
As the play came to a close, and many a character has died, Emilia begins to sing an eerie melody. All of the actors come out on stage, harmonizing with her voice, and two members of the chorus (Ira Mandela Siobhan and Clemmie Sveaas) perform an eloquent ballet routine center stage. This came to represent the passionate, yet inevitably fatal love between Othello and Desdemona. This was an artistically enticing, melancholy way to end the performance. Reflecting on the show, it was truly a well-done production with convincing, memorable performances.
