Veteran Iago Owns Intiman's Othello
Sean Patrick Thomas, Elisabeth Waterston, and John Campion as Othello, Desdemona, and Iago in Shakespeare's play at Intiman (Photo: Chris Bennion)
A much-buzzed-about New York import of Othello opened last night at Intiman (through August 9, tickets: $42-$52; 25-and-under: $10 ), and all night we kept thinking of how even dead and employed solely to smooth over bumps in the plot, the shimmery Obi-Wan Kenobi has you hanging onto his every word in Star Wars.
Intiman's Obi-Wan is John Campion, a veteran performer with a rap role sheet a mile long, and one that includes references to his work with Kevin Kline, Linda Hunt, and F. Murray Abraham. You will understand his Iago like never before. He will speak Shakespeare, but with his own vicious cadence. He will bite off the ends of words, and his body will seem to flood with bile. He will offer mean-spirited putdowns and cough out a fake, social laugh. He will never be likable, but always charismatic as he plots his vengeance.
He will also lead you to make unfortunate comparisons with the rest of the cast. Othello and Desdemona (Sean Patrick Thomas and Elisabeth Waterston) have no visible chemistry, and you start to think Iago's right about them having nothing in common. The two seem in over their heads in Shakespeare-land, and they bring nothing striking to two roles that require believable emotional extremity. Thomas treats his retelling of his blooming love for Desdemona as legal defense, not as a happy dive back into a pool of romantic memory. Sometimes he gives in to the temptation to speed-orate, and passages fly by incomprehensibly.
In fact, of the major players, Lucas Hall as Cassio is the next most compelling. Virtually all the men in Othello have some rotten worm in them, gnawing away, and Hall's Cassio is no saint either. He's more or less in love with both Othello and Desdemona, but can't admit to his baser instincts. Hall can cut a dashing figure, but he gets the little weaknesses, too. As Emilia, Iago's cowed wife, Kate Forbes does fine work, flinching past Iago and working to keep on his good side.
We blame the New York Times for some of the letdown; they told us to expect one of the "most sensitively directed, eloquently designed and impeccably acted productions of a Shakespeare tragedy that the city has seen in years." Wow, we thought, even better than Transformers 2! And in fairness, Arin Arbus's direction has more wins than losses. Though in one too many scenes, people just stood there until their line, Iago's initial, offhand needling of Othello is perfectly set up, and Iago's brutal relationship with his wife is fleshed out particularly well.
But as we think about it, some of our reaction is due to another quarter: Balagan Theatre's Othello, last November. It too was a actor-driven production that unsparingly focused on raw, painful emotions, and left costumed, polite Shakespeare dead on the side of the road. Ryan Higgins directed a rough, martial production that scared you. If we had to choose which production to remount, we'd choose Balagan's. And maybe see if John Campion is free.
