FringeReview UK 2024

Othello

Wanamaker Globe

Genre: Classical and Shakespeare, Contemporary, Drama, Live Music, Mainstream Theatre, Theatre, Tragedy

Venue: Wanamaker Globe, Shakespeare’s Globe

Festival: FringeReview UK

Low Down

Review

Othello might have been born free, but he was soon in chains. Here opening Ola Ince’s production at the Globe’s Wanamaker he’s a star DCI led on in cuffs, in a way that becomes clear. And clarity’s one cardinal virtue among several in this must-see production.

A racist New Scotland Yard yields an otherwise white environment. In its translation to undercover Docklands Shakespeare’s Othello might seem transplanted to Line of Duty, with echoes of George Floyd (Amelia Jane Hankin’s fire-escape and dusty set briefly suggests the US) but disruptive as assistant director Prime Issac’s often witty rewrites might seem, what also emerges is the line of beauty: verse-speaking here is as outstanding as casting.

Neither can always be taken for granted at the Globe. Here though both virtues bite like acid on copper: characterisation is on-point, often revelatory; lines delivered with velocity and pause to let both poetry and verbal updates work.

For instance Cassio’s “one Florentine” becomes “an Eton boy” and so on. Class, with Chelsea-tinged assumptions, inflects Desdemona and Roderigo too. They play off as convincing escalators to conflict with both Iago and Othello – who grew up in the Docklands.

Though it’s some setting-out that suffers. That balcony’s not used for the usual opening of Brabantio-baiting; occasionally Iago’s self-justifying is telescoped. For instance, in his passing-over which might have been made more of in Met and class terms. But at just-on-three hours traffic and a hurtling storyline, these are forgivable. And some traditionally clunky moments go too.

The claustrophobia of Cyprus can’t entirely translate to Docklands undercover activities (a whole police unit!), but it does simmer isolation and possible discovery.

Ken Nwosu’s Othello exudes both authority and a vulnerable sense of class origin, a brief backstory of being criminally used not disbarring him from police work. Nwosu’s power too lies in quiet understatement, as when he dismisses Cassio “Michael I love you. But never more be inspector of mine.” (Occasionally the original “officer” wouldn’t hurt, but this is minor). The way Nwosu delivers low-tessitura lines is magical, as in his reminiscence of wooing. Yet he soars with authority – and danger, as the way Othello’s been damaged and re-abused magnifies in a toxic loop.

Another innovation enjoys mixed if interesting results. Ira Mandela Siobhan is occasionally magical as Subconscious Othello, anguished double of Othello’s othered, divided self. Both expressive and (briefly) vocally impressive, Siobhan shadows, twins, echoes Nwosu in his own ballet-like moves with an identical beige outfit. He apparates though like a Philip Pullman daemon.

This movement can sing beautifully in Siobhan, pitching Othello’s conflict to its quintessence. In the chamber scene Siobhan’s dragged on with one foot by Nwosu, his nature suppressed, beaten by conscious Othello obsessed with “reputation”. Overall though it can clutter Othello’s isolation.

Ralph Davis’ Iago doesn’t need to channel malignity. Davis exudes resentment, emphasising his excuse of wife Emilia’s supposed infidelity. It’s the banality of his evil, the way he escalates it and finds it escalates him that humanises, or betrays seething self-delight.

Charlotte Bate is both downright on men and vigorous in friendship as a quick-witted Emilia, blurred only by one last design on retaining her husband’s love. We see the cracked moment of her disenchantment with Iago, whose attention she wants, when she delivers the handkerchief. Bate visibly clicks with appalled enlightenment in the final scene.

It’s a different, terrible awakening with Poppy Gilbert’s Desdemona, blind to danger in her warm entitlement. Both her love and sense of right can’t fathom it: she’s fearless even after being struck. Privilege is a brief shield, this Desdemona’s own dignity – and love – too quickly recovered till her last moments.

There’s a privileged easiness though with Oli Higginson’s Cassio, not a Florentine cipher but someone with triggers to disturbed, drink-fuelled behaviour in the finest staging of the drunk scene I’ve seen. This breathes, takes its time in a boppy chorus with cast members, in Renell Shaw’s otherwise thriller-thrubbing score. With Bianca (Maggie Musgrove, as quick to righteous anger as amorous) this Cassio’s both languorously amused and contemptible, but somehow charms. Though he’s not granted here a last exchange with Othello.

On the other side of posh, Sam Swann’s Chelsea-slouching Roderigo treads a more farcical than purely idiot line in increasingly bonkers disguises: CSI-suited, Deliveroo for Cassio-baiting and finally from the cellarage a yellow-helmed sewage inspector, Swann’s both uproarious and touching.

David Hounslow is more vigorous than we often see as Commissioner and local chief Montano. Ché Walker breaks out from Brabantio to make Lodovico troubled out of his depth. Sarah Callum and Cory Hippolyte complete an active ensemble.

It’s one of the few productions where I wonder if Anna Watson’s candle-work was always integral (Ghosts was for instance a triumph). A contemporary policing theme of course doesn’t help, though the evocatively-lit bedchamber oozes sacramental murder.

Othello’s “honourable murderer” maleness has been a military preserve: till now. With institutional racism and trauma compounded in a feedback loop, this Othello’s a timely, and timeless broadside on everything toxic we inhale and expel as venom.

Published February 7, 2024 by Simon Jenner