Notes on the New Broadway Staging of Othello
More like....NOTHELLO aka the tragedy of this tragedy is not what you'd expect
We recently went to see Othello on Broadway because I love the play and it’s featuring two of my favorite actors—Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal. I had no idea what to expect but given the talent of the headliners, I expected the show to be great.
Alas.
To begin with, the ticket prices are criminal. Producers have been pushing ticket prices upward for years but recently, it’s getting egregious. If you cannot afford this show, do not spend your hard-earned money. It’s not worth it. We paid $1442 for two tickets, center orchestra, Row G. To be fair, these are pretty great seats but there is no reality in which they should be this expensive. I felt some kind of way when I bought these tickets and I’m very mindful of the privilege of being able to. The seats in the rows in front of us were an absolutely shocking $921 each. This pricing does not make sense. It just doesn’t. Who is this play for beyond the wealthy? Honestly, this question could be asked of most theatre these days. There’s no justification for this price point. It is offensive. It excludes nearly everyone. The producers are charging exorbitant prices because they know wealthy theatergoers will pay to see the marquee talent. It’s pure greed and clearly, it is well-calculated greed because there were no empty seats in the house when we saw the show.
This staging of Othello is not good. At times, it is very bad. I went in with high hopes and left disappointed and confused. When the show opens, the words “In the near future,” are projected on two columns. Why? We don’t know because the staging doesn’t convey anything about a near future. It is firmly grounded in the present. The when of the show is not at all relevant. Contemporary interpretations of Shakespeare can be interesting but there needs to be a sense of why this chronological choice has been made. Such is not the case here. In fact, little about this staging of Othello feels intentional and it’s a shame given the resources put into the production.
Early in the first act, police come to arrest Othello before it becomes clear that Desdemona is willingly in his thrall. We see POLIZIA on the back of their uniforms because they are in Venice, Italy. A bit later, Othello and his Italian soldiers are in Cyprus with American flags on their uniforms. Why oh why? The lack of care that results in this kind of continuity error is… bewildering. If the show were better, I probably would not have noticed this jarring detail.
Alas.
The creative choices are consistently baffling. Othello is a tragedy. Imagine my surprise when the audience started laughing at the most bizarre moments. They treated certain lines and the delivery of certain lines as if the show was a comedy when it decidedly is not. Often times, they laughed, guffawed even, when Iago or Desdemona’s father or Roderigo were being especially racist. As we all know, few things are funnier than racism. Meanwhile, when I laughed, it was a party of one and I was laughing because something uncomfortably bad was happening on stage.
BEHIND THE PAYWALL:
All about Denzel (too old) and Gyllenhaal (very hot) and product placement (???), and the real tragedy of it all, oh my!