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First to perform the role of the Moor
was Richard Burbage, star actor in
the King’s Men, who played all of
Shakespeare’s most celebrated
parts. He was recognized as the
foremost actor of his day, the
Elizabethan equivalent of Tom
Cruise or George Clooney. It was
almost certainly Burbage that
starred in Othello’s 1604 London
debut, although nothing is known
of whether or not he appeared in
blackface, or what costume he
would have worn.
Edmund Kean, the most celebrated
Othello of the 19th century
actually collapsed onstage during a
particularly emotive rendition of
Act 3, Scene III of the play,
performed on March 25th 1833 at
London’s Royal Opera House
theatre, Covent Garden. Keen was
renowned for his ability to touch
audiences with the pathos and
kinetic energy of his performances.
Poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge once
remarked that, ‘Seeing him act was
like reading Shakespeare by
flashes of lightning’. Kean died
two months after the incident,
some say as a result of his
excessively emotive performance.
African American Ira Aldridge
became the first black actor
to play the lead. Born in New
York in 1807, he emigrated
to England in his late teens,
where he succeeded in
becoming a distinguished
Shakespearean, featuring in
many of the Bard’s roles,
including his first major
performance of Othello at
London’s Royalty theatre in
1826.
Italian actor Tommaso
Salvini garnered an
international reputation
playing Shakespeare’s
tragic heroes. In 1869 he
began regular tours of
Europe and the
Americas, performing
Othello in theatres
across London and New
York.
After Ira Aldridge it would be another century
before another black actor would be cast in
the role of the Moor in a major production.
Paul Robeson — lawyer, campaigner,
academic, athlete, singer and actor — was
that man. The son of a former slave, he had
risen to become an international superstar
by the time of his debut at London’s Savoy
Theatre on March 19 1930. The build-up
was highly charged, as it brought with it the
prospect of Robeson kissing a white woman
— actress Peggy Ashcroft — something
audiences at the time had never witnessed.
Fortunately, the play proceeded without
incident. Ashcroft drew rave reviews, and
Robeson received 20 curtain calls. The play
was a big hit, running for 295
performances.
In 1943 Robeson reprised the role on
Broadway, at New York’s Shubert Theatre,
becoming the first ever African American to
play the part in a major American
playhouse.
Welles directed, produced and starred
in this 1952 movie. He used a
heavily abridged text, with the
final film running to 91 minutes.
The style of cinematography is
dark and moody, using shadows to
create atmosphere. Suzanne
Cloutier, who played Desdemona,
dyed her hair bright blonde to
intensify the contrast between her
and her co-star, who appeared in
blackface. Despite winning the
Palme d’Or at the 1952 Cannes
Film Festival, the film was largely
ignored in the US, and became the
least critically acclaimed of Welles’
films of the era.
Olivier played Othello in a movie
version released in December
1965. It was the first English
language film of the play to be
shot in color, and all the action
took place on a series of
enlarged stage sets. Olivier
invented his own basso voice,
and devised a special walk as
part of his preparation. He also
acted in blackface — a darker
black than the café-au-lait tones
that had become customary for
white Othellos since the early
1800s.
It was not until 1995 that a
black actor was cast in a
major screen production of
Othello. Laurence Fishburne
played the Moor, opposite
Kenneth Branagh’s Iago, in a
film adaptation directed by
Oliver Parker. Shot on
location in Italy, the film
added new set pieces,
including a sex scene
between Fishburne and Irène
Jacob as Desdemona. The
production was positioned as
a sexual thriller, designed to
appeal to modern audiences.
In November 1997 he featured in a
radical re-interpretation of the play
at the Shakespeare Theatre,
Washington D.C. In what was
termed a ‘photo negative’
production by British director Jude
Kelly, all the other cast members
aside from Stewart were black.
This race reversing was intended to
both challenge stereotypes and to
reflect the endlessly adaptive
nature of Shakespeare’s work. To
give the performance a modern
spin, the male characters were
decked out in combat fatigues, and
Stewart’s shaved head was
accessorized with a hooped earring
and a serpent tattoo.
In August 2001 Mekhi Phifer starred in an
updated movie version of
Shakespeare’s play, re-titled O. This
was an urban Othello for the hip-hop
generation, written by Brad Kaaya and
directed by Tim Blake Nelson. The
movie substituted ancient Venice for
the basketball court of an American
high school, where Othello, now Odin
James, was the star player, and the
school’s sole African American
student. Desdemona (re-named Desi),
was played by Julia Stiles, and Iago
(re-named Hugo), by Josh Hartnett.
The film injected many of it’s own
contemporary scenes and references,
while retaining Shakespeare’s basic
plot, which had a fresh context here,
given the longstanding cultural
anxieties about race in the US.
In 2008, artistic directors Scott
Graham and Steven Hoggett of
London-based theatre group
Frantic Assembly staged a unique
adaptation of Othello. In their
version the action was transposed
from ancient Venice to modern-day
northern England — a decaying
working class town in which the
Moor was the sole black
inhabitant. He worked as head
doorman at a troublesome local
pub. In place of a classical stage
set, the action centred around a
pool table and slot machine, and
the characters spoke with UK
regional accents.
Jones had already famously played
Othello on Broadway back in 1981
— but this was different. On May
12, 2009, just months after taking
office, President Obama hosted the
first White House Evening of
Poetry, Music and the Spoken
Word. Jones — probably the most
famous voice in America — took
to the stage with the majestic
demeanour of a well-loved
politician, and mesmerised the
celebrity audience with a masterful
six-minute monologue from Act I,
Scene III of the play. In doing so
he reset the standard for all master
Shakespeareans.
Perhaps the most original and
controversial Othello ever was
staged at Berlin’s Deutsches
Theater in February 2011. For
director Jette Steckel the
casting of the lead veered as far
away from the old traditions of
race and gender as it was
possible to go. Her Othello was
played by a white woman,
German actress Susanne Wolff.
This scrambled the sexual
dynamics of the original, as it
now meant that Desdemona,
still cast as female, was in love
with a woman.