Othello at the National Theatre

Last year, I realised the Giles Terera, who I've seen, and been very impressed by, in his own play ' The Meaning of Zong', and as Aaron Burr in 'Hamilton'  was going to be appearing at the National Theatre, as 'Othello', so I wanted to go, and persuaded my friends, E and A to come with me. 

The Thames, and London Skyline

We all arrived in London early enough to meet up for a second breakfast,  before heading over to the South Bank for drinks and nibbles, then the show. It was a beautiful day, with lovely views along the THames, towards St Pauls, as we crossed to the South Bank.

It's a play I've only seen a few times before, I think, twice  at the Globe - once with Eammon Walker and TIm McInnerny, and once with Andre Holland and  Mark Rylance, and in Bath with Lenny Henry as Othello and Conrad Nelson as Iago. I think the last of those was on 2018, so it's been a while since I've seen the play.

Set, before the play started

In this production, the set is pretty minimalist - a series of tiers and staircases, which, before the play began were covered with projections of posters and playbills for older productions of Othello, and a cast member was cleaning the stage - cleaning away older iterations and assumptions about the play, perhaps?

This version of the play puts the inherent racism and misogyny of the characters front and centre - Iago (Paul Hilton) appears like a cut-price Moseley, all black shirt and pencil moustache, and there is a chorus (at times appearing as a literal mob with flaming torches) to back him up.  The Venetian nobility praise Othello's military prowess, and are, of course, quick to send him to defend them from the invading Ottoman navy, but will not shake his hand.

There's also a scene where Othello, called from his marital bed, is seen shirtless, his back showing the scars of beatings and giving us a very visceral reminder of his history of having been enslaved. 

NT Publicity Photo -
Rosy McEwan as Desdemona and Giles Terera as Othello

 As the play progresses, we also see Emilia, Iago's wife,(Tanya Franks) who (per the text) is used by her husband, to take the handkerchief which he uses to convince Othello that Desdemona has been unfaithful, performed explicitly as a victim of domestic abuse, both attracted to, and frightened of, her husband. It's a powerful performance, and provides a rationale for Emilia's sympathy towards Desdemona and her silence in the face of Othello's growing suspicions. It comes across particularly strongly in her speech in Act 4.

I thought it was a very interesting production, and one which gave a new perspective on the play, but not easy to watch.

After the play, we went to Mere where we enjoyed some wonderful cocktails and a fantastic meal, of which, for me, the highlight was the dessert - a beautiful sphere containing coconut Mousse, kumquat Marmalade, and coffee mousse, flavour which I didn't think sounded as though thy would work together, but which really, really, did!

Given the rather unreliable habits of GWR at the moment, I'd opted to stay overnight and come home on SUnday morning - I had thought I might go to the British Library's ALexander the Great exhibition, but in the end I was too tired and din't fancy hanging around until 11 for it to open, so instead, I got the first train home (delayed by half an hour!) 

Everywhere was covered in heavy hoar frost, and looked lovely, if rather cold! 

I believe tht Othello is going to be broadcast to cinemas via NTLive on 23rd February, and hopefully on NTatHome after tht. I think it's worth seeing.