OTHELLO – REVIEW OF 2024 PRODUCTION AT SAM WANAMAKER THEATRE, LONDON

Reviewed by James Karas

The famous Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre is celebrating the 10^th year of productions in the small, enclosed Sam Wanamaker Theatre that made it possible to have a winter season in addition to the summer offerings in its open-air theatre on the south bank of the Thames River.

Othello is one of this winter’s main productions and one must give highly laudable and deserved reviews to the actors. The problem is the choices made by director Ola Ince who has decided to Improve Shakespeare’s play.

Before I launch my catalogue of dislikes about the production, let me mention the positive features. The cast is excellent, starting with Ken Nwosu as Othello, an actor with a sonorous voice who delivers his pentameters with gorgeous musicality when he is not insane with jealousy and with precision when he is. When he is murderously jealous, he is truly dramatic. The evil Iago of Ralph Davis is a venomous creature and a good actor in his ability to convince people of his honesty and integrity.

Poppy Gilbert’s Desdemona is forthright and beautiful. She knows how to state her position and defend herself. We admire her and the actor playing her.

 

                                     Ken Nwosu as Othello and Poppy Gilbert as Desdemona. 
                                                    Photo Johan Persson

Ince embarks on a director’s ego trip paying scant attention to the script and the result is simply awful. Making changes and taking liberties with Shakespeare’s text is almost de rigueur and most of the time not only do we not complain but laud the director for his/her imagination and brilliance. Not this time.

Without mentioning chapter and verse, here are a few of  Ince’s additions/subtractions to the play, let’s start with the addition of a mime to the play. Othello and Desdemona appear before a priest and are married.

As we all know, Othello opens with Iago and Rodrigues rioting in front of the house of Desdemona’s father, salaciously intimating that the Moor has taken his daughter. Ola has set the play in modern day London and the characters are mostly police officers in the Metropolitan Police. They are facing some serious criminals, perhaps terrorists in the docklands and the problem needs an experienced Police Commissioner like Othello to quell it.

All well and good. But it is here that things become muddled. Does Ola want a police thriller or a psychological tale and not what Shakespeare provided? Othello has a conscience but Ola adds a character, Subconscious Othello (Ira Mandela Siobhan) who is very conscious and active on the stage. You may recall that near the end of the play Othello faces the sleeping Desdemona alone in her bed and decides that he must strangle  her. In this production he is accompanied by Subconscious Othello and there is a physical struggle between the Conscious and Subconscious Othellos. The murder scene becomes a threesome.

When Othello says the unforgettable lines beginning with “It is the cause” Subconscious Othello repeats some of the lines wrecking the sonority of the stunning pentameters. Subconscious Othello accompanies Othello throughout most of the play and to call his presence annoying is the politest thing one can say. Much stronger words are called for but I will desist.

                                        Ken Nwosu as Othello and Ralph Davis as Iago. 
                                                            Photo: Johan Persson

 We know that Othello descends from a noble, self-controlled, high-ranking officer and becomes an ugly, jealous and murderous being. In the final scene he regains his composure and nobility. He has realized his crime and the blows he suffered at the hands of his trusted lieutenant, “honest” Iago. In his final speech he rises to his previous self and describes a heroic act against someone who beat up a Venetian and insulted Venice with the words “I took by the throat the circumcised dog and smote him thus” and stabs himself.

That unforgettable scene is not good enough for Ince and she has Othello lunge at Iago and he is stopped by the guards and given a severe beating as he lies on the floor. Yes, that is how the play ends in a perversion that polite words can barely describe.

The setting of the play in today’s London is awkward but works if you take out the serious cuts to the text and the switch to psychological interpretations or a simple police drama. Desdemona aka Des comes from Chelsea and there are other changes made to accommodate the script to Ince’s vision.

The set by Designer Amelia Jane Hankin is simple and acceptable. But there is one aspect that I found interesting. There is a sign in the foyer that states Theatre by Candlelight. That’s very romantic but the theater has been doing simply fine with electric lighting. Several dozen candles are lit one at a time and later snuffed. I saw no advantage in doing so except for the waste of time. The script was cut and we would have preferred more of Shakespeare’s words and less playing with candles.

A horrible night at the theatre.
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Othello by William Shakespeare continues until April 13, 2024, in the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, 21 New Globe Walk, London SE1 9DT, London. www.shakespeares-globe.org

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press