Customer Reviews

William Shakespeare: Othello

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have never made up my mind if it is more painful to watch "Othello" or "King Lear." In both cases, you feel like leaping onto the stage and strangling the leading character for being so utterly stupid. It is the supreme test of any actor to make these men sympathetic enough to move an audience to tears. Once during a lecture, someone asked me for a fast distinction between comedy and tragedy and I came up with "Comedy is what happens when women are in charge, tragedy when men are." I do not think I have seen a really satisfactory performance of "Othello" (in which a good man in charge is taken over by an evil man). More often than not, Iago steals the show, mainly because he is having such a good time duping the entire cast right down to the last few minutes of Act V.


However, we now have an Image Entertainment DVD of a nearly complete "Othello" (ID2622RZDVD) shown on British television in 1990, based on a Royal Shakespeare production directed by Trevor Nunn. Now I do not know what Italian military uniforms looked like in about 1865, when this play seems to be set, but the ones you see are far too much like American Civil War garb. However, there is a point that helps us understand Iago to this "anything but the historical period setting and costuming" attitude toward staging classics nowadays.


Nunn was astute enough to cast an opera baritone, Willard White (whom you might have seen as a magnificent Porgy on an EMI video of the Gershwin work), in the title role. He is able to do with the great rolling iambic lines what another black actor found utterly beyond him in a film version not too long ago, and in the early part of the play he gives us a very likable Othello.


His evil genius, Iago, is played by Ian McKellen as all soldier, standing at strict attention at times even when addressing the audience. Here the blue Union uniform looks just right for a man who will use any "good cause" to conceal his villainy. Unhappily, though, he often lapses into whispers and mutterings that are simply unintelligible-and that too seems to be a sure sign of recent film making.


Nunn has given Imogen Stubbs all the right moves for Desdemona; but I find her voice a little squeaky and her physical appearance a little too girlish to bear the weight of the role. Yes, she is very good but somehow I found her not right. Perhaps you will disagree entirely.


Clive Swift (from "Keeping Up Appearances") is directed to shout far too much as Desdemona's father, while Michael Grandage as the idiot Roderigo is made to fall onto the floor like a spoiled brat (which he is) in a temper tantrum (which looks absurd). The Cassio (Sean Baker) is adequate, the Bianca (Marsha A. Hunt) amateurish. On the other hand, Zoe Wanamaker makes a superb Emilia, and Nunn has found some interesting aspects of her relationship with her "honest" husband, Iago.


The only lines I noticed omitted are most of those between Cassio and the clown, here a silly solider, in a scene that is almost always entirely cut. The pacing is at times far too slow-the video runs 205 minutes-but you really must see this production many times for the great acting of White and McKellen. English and Drama Departments, take note.

I have only seen two other productions of Othello. One was an amateurish high-school like production staged as it would have been in Elizabethan times complete with Elizebethan sets and a second one was a production at my high-school set in what was either a modern day boot camp or Iraq with the sort of acting that should have been in the first production I saw. But this one takes the cake. The acting is amazing. Trevor Nunn has given us an amazing production as he has done so before with "Porgy and Bess", "The Merchant of Venice", and "Oklahoma" shattering all set stereotypes. What we get is a powerful production of Shakespeare's tale of jealousy. In short, it's a freakin' good show.

Willard White displays great magnitude as Othello. Imogen Stubbs, a.k.a. Mrs. Trevor Nunn, gives us a Desdemona totally fresh and free of all stereotypes. Zoe Wanamaker (otherwise known to younger audiences as Madame Hooch from the first Harry Potter movie) is an amazing Emilia. But the performance that steals the show is Ian McKellen as Iago. Sure he mumbles a lot but what a voice he has. What I especially love is how each monologue or soliloquy or aside is addressed to the camera as if we are part of the action. It helps to feed the tension onscreen. I also felt that the costumes were very Civil War-ish. If they were trying to set the show in the civil war, they forgot to get rid of their British accents. I don't know what it was. Despite these flaws, it was an amazing performance that is worthy of five stars.

Othello is a difficult production for me to watch at any time. Seeing the horrors of jealousy run amuck to the destruction of innocence is painful at the best of times. In the instance of this production it is even more painful because it is so well done.

The story of Othello is that of a Venetian general who marries a local daughter of a nobleman. The general happens to be black. In an effort to sabotage the general, Iago undermines the faith of the husband for his wife leading ultimately to the tragedy of her death. While Shakespeare gives motivations for his characters, interpretations and emphases tend to vary. Kenneth Brannagh's production of Othello emphasies Iago as a troublemake who likes to cause trouble simple for the sake of doing so. This production, with Ian McKellan in the role of Iago, puts more emphasis on his desire for revenge in reaction to a perceived slight. Both are accurate portrayals but the former seems to show more delight in "being bad" wheras the latter seems more inclined to "get even". Both are excellent and accurate but the emphasis in this film makes the heaviness of the theme that much more difficult to endure.

The role of Desdemona is portrayed in this version by Imogen Stubb and she is a delight to watch. She bring an alluring innocence to the role that makes her demise all that much more tragic. So too is the title role played admirably. The problem with Othello is that he is at heart and honorable man but lets his passions rule him and cause him to lash out with devatiging consequence.

This is a fine performance all around with a difficult play. If you can keep your anger at the antics of the characters in check, it is well worth the time.

This review in on the 205 minutes Royal Shakespeare Company Production of Othello starring Ian McKellen as Iago.

Film Setting:
While it is difficult to gage the precise time setting of the film, one is led to believe based upon the dress of the characters that it occurs in the mid to late 1800s since characters, such as Othello, wear Civil War era military uniforms.

Drawing Parallels:
The play is a stage production similar to A&E's production of Romeo and Juliet, with the exception that some lines (but not many) are cut from this Othello production. Film is really dark (poor lighting). [Therefore, I had to raise the lighting setting on my DVD portable DVD player in order to clearly see and interpret the facial expressions of the characters.]

Some Interesting Changes/Interpretations:
Cassio gives Desdemona his officer's coat to wear in 2.1. When Othello arrives, he sees Desdemona wearing Cassio's coat. [While Othello does not say anything about this, the film viewer may interpret this action as one piece of circumstantial evidence that might lead Othello to believe something sexual is going on between the two.]

In 2.3., Iago spikes the wine with some stronger alcoholic beverage. This helps to explain the inconsistency within the play of how Cassio could have become so intoxicated with so little to drink.


FILM'S ENDING:
Film ends with two images that rotate back and forth: The first is Iago's face as he (seemingly) views the dead bodies of Othello and Desdemona lying on the bed. The second is Othello and Desdemona lying on the bed, dead, Othello's arm around Desdemona's waist.

The very final shot before the background turns completely black is one of Iago's face, seemingly unrepentant despite all the pain and suffering he had caused due to his plots and scheming.

MY RATING:
The production is a bit more stage-like than I would have liked. Also, the quality of the DVD is a bit poor and may require you to change the color settings on your TV. Overall, however, the film is quite good. Ian McKellen is a far better Iago in my opinion than Lawrence Oliver or Kenneth Branagh.

As wonderful a production of Othello as there can be found. Plus, it's shot as a stage production which gives it leverage as an educational tool.

Sir Ian McKellan is a perfectly villainous Iago, Imogen Stubbs is a feisty (for a change!) Desdemona. The proof of the pudding is that this cast was continually called upon to reprise their performance of this play at various times and places over a period of seven years before it was finally preserved on video. If you saw the movie version with Kenneth Branagh and Lawrence Fishburne, this version will seem a bit claustrophobic. It's actually fitting for the story, as Othello and Desdemona are forced into the small spaces society makes for them and end up destroyed, not just by Othello's jealousy, but by society's lack of tolerance. This is the most technically perfect of Shakespeare's tragedies, and I am so glad we have this version on film. Sadly, Sir John Gielgud's Hamlet (dubbed to have been a performance "for the ages") was never filmed; I wish so much it had been.

Much of the cast is very good and I enjoyed McKellen as Iago - an interpretstion different from most others......I am not sure how well the civil war setting works - interesting though

Creative, Timeless, Moving. The greatest Shakespearian director of our day, Trevor Nun, has done it again.
I had my doubts.
Usually when I watch a production of Othello, I just know that the whole "deception" of Othello will seem pretty unbelievable at worst and a real stretch at best leaving Othello looking like a real chump; I know that Desdemona will be such an angelic, innocent, boring, flat character that I really won't CARE that she gets killed. I just know these things and I just deal with it and hope that my favorite scenes and monologues will come out OK.
NO LONGER. Those two common weaknesses are the STRENGTHS of this production. Willard White's Othello is brought down as a truly sympathetic and tragic character like never before, while Desdemona charms us from the first and establishes herself as a VERY likable Character. Iago here is played with all the charm and honesty that Sir Ian McKellen can muster, making him all the more SATANIC.
All of these factors go to make the final Tragic scene what it should be: Almost unbearable to watch.
This is the Bard at its absolute best.

So much of Orson Welles' Othello rendered unintelligible by technical glitches, it is somehow back-handedly fitting to find Ian McKellen achieving the same effect out of simple interpretive perversity, rushing wildly, incomprehensibly through 1/3 of his lines, chumblingly swallowing another 1/3. (It may not be fair to fault him for so 'interesting' an attempt--the notion of phony working class touchy-feeliness might have been Trevor Nunn's.) Whereas traditional plumes, turbans,"neighing steeds" and floor length robes can cover a lot of inanity, this obviously low budget, lower imagination production offers no space in which to hide it's time-shifted pointlessness. (Recalling the legends of Welles' costuming problems, one wonders if this entire concept hinged on Royal Shakespeare's wardrobe out-of-stock except for left-overs from some Yank Civil War turkey.)

It has to be said that Imogen Stubbs might have made a touching Desdemona in a less change-for-the-sake-of-change production. And what a delight to hear Willard White articulating in his vibrant, Robesonesque bass tones, battling not only Iago and the Fates, but the sort of clever-dick innovations that transmute a High Testosterone Warrior/Man-of-Action into a bureaucratic paper shuffler and wielder of rubber stamps.

For some reason watching stage on t.v. is addicting its just a very different. Ian Mckellan is great in this in which he was awarded for his outstanding performance. Just be sure not to miss this underated gem