Theatre Review: Othello (Globe)
Sep. 24th, 2018 09:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
grondficWe've had rather a lot to do with Shakespeare's Globe during its summer season. I may try to give an overview of the whole thing once we complete our summer viewing with Eyam in early October; but in the meantime, I'll deal with the two we saw just before our holiday break.
I was originally going to do them in one posting; but I've found so much to say about Othello that I'm posting it and Emilia in separate entries, so -
Othello (The Globe)
I'm going to have to confess that my views on this piece might be unreliable. The reason for this is that, during a crucial scene, the lady sitting next to me leaned in and whispered "I think I'm going to faint!" Cue a complete shambles in our seating-section, during which my neighbour was hoisted as far as the hastily-vacated bench below us, stretched out, feet raised, water produced, volunteer-ushers in rather useless attendance etc etc. Finally she was removed ... only to be returned and hoisted back in again - just as the scene ended at the interval.
The reasons why I sound less than sympathetic are (a) The scene that our whole section missed was the one where Iago gets to grips with instilling horrible suspicions in Othello's head; and (b) the only person in the entire block who got to see the scene in its entirety was the fainter's partner, who sat stolidly staring at the stage whilst the world whorled around him. Pah!
[//rant\\ I've always said that the main problem with The Globe and its seating arrangements isn't the hard wooden benches or restricted space and views; it's the rest of the bloody audience! //rant over\\]
All that said, I felt that this Othello was a bit of a mixed-bag. It was directed by Clare van Kampen, starred her husband Mark Rylance; and should, in this instance, really have been retitled Iago! Other actors did get a bit of a look-in, however; notably André Holland (better known, perhaps, in his native USA than here) playing Othello with an intentional 'different accent' from the rest of the cast; Steffan Donnelly as a more charismatic Roderigo than some I've seen; Jessica Warbeck as a feisty Desdemona; and - TOWERING over everyone (quite literally - she's a tall lady) - Sheila Atim's epic Emilia.
[Confession - I was really REALLY hoping that Emilia and Desdemona came to their senses halfway through the play, and took off into the sunset together, leaving all the stupid men to their silly games! Yup, there goes another one into the Shakespeare plotbunny-pen]
The script was cut to the bone (van Kampen explains in the programme that they are obeying Shakespeare's express orders in doing this, since he refers to 'two hours traffic' in the prologue to Romeo and Juliet). So a lot of the poetry of Othello, as well as chunks of storyline, get lost to the savage cleaving.
Within this reduced framework, Shakespeare's ploy of having Iago address the audience direct to reveal his feelings and details of his plots, plays happily into the Iago-centric emphasis in this production.
In case you hadn't guessed, I wasn't really very impressed by Rylance's Iago. (I say this in sorrow, because we loved him as the mad King in Farinelli and the King, and in Wolf Hall on tv)
A lot has been written about his strange costume. It's been compared to that of a bellboy or alternatively, a veteran of the Confederate army. There's a pic heading the article here -
https://www.whatsonstage.com/london-theatre/news/mark-rylance-andre-holland-othello-globe-photos_47243.html
The bellhop is maybe more apposite, because Rylance bobs and pops around the stage busily; interacting with the front row, confiding his hatred and his plots. He plays outrageously to the audience, well-versed in the give-and-take at the Globe. In fact he runs his whole plot as one massive joke; so that when he murders the poor deluded patsy Roderigo, there's an incredulous gasp from the pit.
In fact, IMHO, he gets so wrapped-up in the jokey-Iago persona that there's this massive vacuum at the centre of the performance. 'Nihilist evil' doesn't cover it as an explanation, because the professed hatred is well-outweighed by the one-liners; and - for me - the performance didn't hang together at all. (Sadly this puts me Shoulders with Quentin Letts, but that's what I think).
So - to the rest.
André Holland makes a very sexy Othello, with an extremely soft centre. His southern U.S. accent is meant to mark him off as 'a stranger'; as opposed to 'being a person of colour', since several other members of the cast are also black - notably Aaron Pierre's Cassio, and of course, Sheila Atim's Emilia. (Part of Iago's beef with him is that he's a successful general for Venice, but not 'a local': the grievance has been generalised, because the specific racist angle has possibly been nullified by the fact that Iago's own wife is black. It would, in fact, be MORE intriguing if the racist motive were left in, but he STILL married a woman of colour - although the marriage would be even more horrible than it is usually portrayed)
Because of the reduced nature of this version, Othello appears especially gullible and ready to accept immediately Iago's 'evidence' of Desdemona's infidelity. It's heartbreaking to see how fast this personable, confident, army-commander disintegrates into despair and (sadly) marital violence once Iago's lies take hold on him.
I loved Steffan Donnelly's gullible rejected-suitor Roderigo; but found Aaron Pierre's Cassio rather creepy with all his macho womanising.
For me, the backbone of the whole piece was the strong bond between Jessica Warbeck's unusually strong-minded Desdemona, and Emilia. Their duet on The poor soul sat sighing was a thing of beauty and, as I say, I wanted nothing other than that they eloped together forthwith. Sadly there was no alternative ending this time.
Instead, to cheer the audience at the end, the usual 'jig' was transmuted into a balletic retelling of the Othello/Desdemona love-story by two members of the chorus - Clemmie Sveaas, an accomplished theatre-dancer who we'd seen in The Most Incredible Thing at Sadlers Wells, and Ira Mandela Siobhan, last seen at the Globe as Posthumus in Imogen. It made for a sweet ending to a very mixed bag. And at least no one danced Iago!
I was originally going to do them in one posting; but I've found so much to say about Othello that I'm posting it and Emilia in separate entries, so -
Othello (The Globe)
I'm going to have to confess that my views on this piece might be unreliable. The reason for this is that, during a crucial scene, the lady sitting next to me leaned in and whispered "I think I'm going to faint!" Cue a complete shambles in our seating-section, during which my neighbour was hoisted as far as the hastily-vacated bench below us, stretched out, feet raised, water produced, volunteer-ushers in rather useless attendance etc etc. Finally she was removed ... only to be returned and hoisted back in again - just as the scene ended at the interval.
The reasons why I sound less than sympathetic are (a) The scene that our whole section missed was the one where Iago gets to grips with instilling horrible suspicions in Othello's head; and (b) the only person in the entire block who got to see the scene in its entirety was the fainter's partner, who sat stolidly staring at the stage whilst the world whorled around him. Pah!
[//rant\\ I've always said that the main problem with The Globe and its seating arrangements isn't the hard wooden benches or restricted space and views; it's the rest of the bloody audience! //rant over\\]
All that said, I felt that this Othello was a bit of a mixed-bag. It was directed by Clare van Kampen, starred her husband Mark Rylance; and should, in this instance, really have been retitled Iago! Other actors did get a bit of a look-in, however; notably André Holland (better known, perhaps, in his native USA than here) playing Othello with an intentional 'different accent' from the rest of the cast; Steffan Donnelly as a more charismatic Roderigo than some I've seen; Jessica Warbeck as a feisty Desdemona; and - TOWERING over everyone (quite literally - she's a tall lady) - Sheila Atim's epic Emilia.
[Confession - I was really REALLY hoping that Emilia and Desdemona came to their senses halfway through the play, and took off into the sunset together, leaving all the stupid men to their silly games! Yup, there goes another one into the Shakespeare plotbunny-pen]
The script was cut to the bone (van Kampen explains in the programme that they are obeying Shakespeare's express orders in doing this, since he refers to 'two hours traffic' in the prologue to Romeo and Juliet). So a lot of the poetry of Othello, as well as chunks of storyline, get lost to the savage cleaving.
Within this reduced framework, Shakespeare's ploy of having Iago address the audience direct to reveal his feelings and details of his plots, plays happily into the Iago-centric emphasis in this production.
In case you hadn't guessed, I wasn't really very impressed by Rylance's Iago. (I say this in sorrow, because we loved him as the mad King in Farinelli and the King, and in Wolf Hall on tv)
A lot has been written about his strange costume. It's been compared to that of a bellboy or alternatively, a veteran of the Confederate army. There's a pic heading the article here -
https://www.whatsonstage.com/london-theatre/news/mark-rylance-andre-holland-othello-globe-photos_47243.html
The bellhop is maybe more apposite, because Rylance bobs and pops around the stage busily; interacting with the front row, confiding his hatred and his plots. He plays outrageously to the audience, well-versed in the give-and-take at the Globe. In fact he runs his whole plot as one massive joke; so that when he murders the poor deluded patsy Roderigo, there's an incredulous gasp from the pit.
In fact, IMHO, he gets so wrapped-up in the jokey-Iago persona that there's this massive vacuum at the centre of the performance. 'Nihilist evil' doesn't cover it as an explanation, because the professed hatred is well-outweighed by the one-liners; and - for me - the performance didn't hang together at all. (Sadly this puts me Shoulders with Quentin Letts, but that's what I think).
So - to the rest.
André Holland makes a very sexy Othello, with an extremely soft centre. His southern U.S. accent is meant to mark him off as 'a stranger'; as opposed to 'being a person of colour', since several other members of the cast are also black - notably Aaron Pierre's Cassio, and of course, Sheila Atim's Emilia. (Part of Iago's beef with him is that he's a successful general for Venice, but not 'a local': the grievance has been generalised, because the specific racist angle has possibly been nullified by the fact that Iago's own wife is black. It would, in fact, be MORE intriguing if the racist motive were left in, but he STILL married a woman of colour - although the marriage would be even more horrible than it is usually portrayed)
Because of the reduced nature of this version, Othello appears especially gullible and ready to accept immediately Iago's 'evidence' of Desdemona's infidelity. It's heartbreaking to see how fast this personable, confident, army-commander disintegrates into despair and (sadly) marital violence once Iago's lies take hold on him.
I loved Steffan Donnelly's gullible rejected-suitor Roderigo; but found Aaron Pierre's Cassio rather creepy with all his macho womanising.
For me, the backbone of the whole piece was the strong bond between Jessica Warbeck's unusually strong-minded Desdemona, and Emilia. Their duet on The poor soul sat sighing was a thing of beauty and, as I say, I wanted nothing other than that they eloped together forthwith. Sadly there was no alternative ending this time.
Instead, to cheer the audience at the end, the usual 'jig' was transmuted into a balletic retelling of the Othello/Desdemona love-story by two members of the chorus - Clemmie Sveaas, an accomplished theatre-dancer who we'd seen in The Most Incredible Thing at Sadlers Wells, and Ira Mandela Siobhan, last seen at the Globe as Posthumus in Imogen. It made for a sweet ending to a very mixed bag. And at least no one danced Iago!
no subject
Date: 2018-09-25 08:52 am (UTC)LOL! Do they faint all the time or something? This time, he was damn well going to see the play??
0_o
no subject
Date: 2018-09-25 09:48 am (UTC)