Ruth Leon recommends… Othello – National Theatre
UncategorizedOthello – National Theatre
This new and radical production by Clint Dyer has been warmly welcomed by audiences and critics at the National Theatre despite or maybe because of its somewhat unusual perspective. This Othello is at least as much about misogyny as about racism, and the women – Desdemona, of course, but also Emelia, Iago’s wife – are its victims as much or more than Othello himself.
It was just a matter of time before Giles Terera took on the title role. Shakespeare’s soldier knows exactly what to do on the battlefield but is hesitant and nervous in the rest of his life, so when he falls in love with Desdemona he is literally destroyed by his own feelings. As in all his performances Terera mines every line for nuance and although his onstage relationship with Rosy McEwan’s Desdemona lacks essential chemistry, he makes up for it with his obvious admiration for her.
I am less taken with Paul Hilton’s Iago which, in this performance, is more of a panto villain than the evil lynchpin of a complex set of psychological outcomes.
Watch out for the director’s unexpected reading of the end of the play. It works, but is like no Othello you’ve seen before. Which is a very good reason for watching it.
I think most regular readers already have a subscription to National Theatre At Home but for those of you who want only to watch Othello, you can rent it for £7.99 for three days.
Yawn, such predictable casting, challenge us with a Black trans lesbian Desdemona driving their Asian non-binary cross-dressing Othello to suicide.
This is an imaginative and fascinating production – except that the Iago is pretty terrible.