Reviews for Othello (London) w Rylance and Andre Holland

Rylance's take on Iago is something I've always been curious about. How does one approach the role that is arguably Shakespeare's most fascinating creation, one that has been the cornerstone for so many villainous characters in literature and media since? Reading these reviews, of course The Standing Man decides to flaunt convention and blaze his own trail, fucking with all of our expectations of grand diabolical speeches and instead making Iago more of an underminer than an overseer, not pulling puppet-strings but rather tugging at rugs under Othello's feet. I hope I get to see this one.

Regardless of the quality of Olivier's performance as Othello, the fact of the matter is that it is the sort of role written explicitly for an actor of color, and he made that movie in the midst of the civil rights movement. I don't know Olivier's intent, but it's not like there weren't accomplished black actors who could've played the part against himself as Iago, if he wanted to tell the story. Olivier likely saw it as a challenging role and tackled it, but he really shouldn't have done so because the story of Othello is a racial one, and the optics of today rightly point out that a white actor taking on the role is in poor form, particularly where blackface is involved.

To complain about how white actors can't play Othello anymore is incredibly tone-deaf; it's not like there is a dearth of characters out there for white people to play, considering that white has been the default race for centuries when it comes to this sort of thing. Othello is a role specifically written for an actor of color/minority, one of the few classical roles that is, and Olivier had the ability to cast someone suitable for the role while still using his name as clout if he'd played Iago. But taking on the part was a bad call, and I don't blame actors today looking at that decision and laughing at him. David Harewood's right: he knows that Olivier playing the part was ludicrous.

I'm all for gender-flipping roles and particularly race-blind casting for most things, but when the subject matter deals so intrinsically with race relations and the subject of racial identity/conflict (as Othello is), you can't muck around with it. What Olivier did was a Kirk Lazarus move, one rightly skewered by Tropic Thunder. Because in taking on that role and smearing gunk on his face to approximate another ethnicity, it's no longer about the acting/diction, but rather that Olivier thinks that such a role is merely skin-deep. It isn't.

I know he was nominated. I look at what he and Orson Welles did (in the same role) as both daring in terms of their presentations of the story, but the optics of blackface are just too distracting. Olivier in particular, because by that time the criticism of how minstrelsy was used in representation of black culture was much more abundant in 1965 than it was in '51. I think that Olivier had good intentions, but I also think that being from across the pond, he was a bit more tone-deaf about how it came off. You say he came off of a memorable performance of Iago and wanted to tackle the Moor himself, but that speaks more to his ego than anything else.

Rylance, at least, is flaunting convention by playing Iago without the cruel Machiavellian overtones established by previous classic incarnations of the character. By the looks of it, he's much more rustic, working-class, seeming less like the grand manipulator and more like a guy with a grudge and a hate-on. But it's just not the same as deciding to put makeup on his face to make him look like a different ethnicity, because at that point there are cultural lines that you're overstepping that really oughtn't be, and to say that it's "daring" and "challenging" is kind of a glib dismissal of the issue. The role of Othello is one of the rare few in literature established specifically for an actor of color. To take that away from a capable actor who fits that description and give it to someone who doesn't, all for the sake of "an actor trying something new", just doesn't fly today, nor should it. There are limits to what an artist can and should do. It's up to them to manage those limits and use them to their benefit.

I guess we are going to disagree on this.

Rylance is getting quite a few mixed reviews for this. He'll get his share of automatic blowjobs because he's Mark Rylance, but I'm reading some critics (and quite a few audience members who saw the play) saying he's playing Iago like he's in a comedy and it's unbalancing the play.

Holland seems to be getting solid notices across the board.