As rehearsal began, Iago (Zan Gillies ’09), Cassio (Keegan Cassidy ’10) and Roderigo (Alex Kyrios ’09) did a preliminary run of the fight scene. This was part of the director’s approach to the production: setting a classic play in the modern era. The men were fully clad in modern naval uniforms, the women in modern dresses. The set was minimal, with only a few pieces of furniture - the bed had served as a desk in a previous scene. Desdemona (Mollie Marie Fitzhugh ’10) lounged across a bed with a curtain draped across her. last Monday, the cast of “Othello” gathered in the Commonwealth for a dress rehearsal. One of them, sporting dark hair and a beard, occasionally speaks in Arabic. Although Stewart’s sentiments are to be applauded, the reality within the industry is that black actors are seldom given such latitude when they apply for roles that may have been written or envisaged for white actors.If, at 7:30 tonight, you happen to be in the UC Commonwealth Auditorium, you will stumble upon an animated group of characters, dressed in completely modern clothing but speaking 15th Century vernacular. “In the big picture, everyone should be able to play anything, and I am against embargoes on actors playing roles that differ from their own ethnicity or gender,” he stated. WHITE OTHELLO REDUX In July 2015 Stewart announced that he was to reprise his role as white Othello, twenty years after playing it in Washington, this time in his own London production of Shakespeare's play. To give the performance a modern spin, the male characters were decked out in combat fatigues, and Stewart’s shaved head was accessorised with a hooped earring and a tattoo of a serpent. This whitening of Othello - or “race reversing” as it is sometimes called - was intended to both challenge stereotypes and to reflect the endlessly adaptive nature of Shakespeare’s work. In what was termed a “photo negative” production by British director Jude Kelly, all the other cast members aside from Stewart were black. PHOTO NEGATIVE WHITE OTHELLO Stewart featured in a radical re-interpretation of the play at the Shakespeare Theatre, Washington D.C. In what had become an exclusively African American role in the US, Stewart caused a stir in November 1997 when he was cast as the first white Othello for more than half a century. One notable example starred film and theatre actor Sir Patrick Stewart, better known for his roles in Star Trek: Next Generation and X-Men. SIR PATRICK STEWART RECAST AS WHITE OTHELLO Theatre productions of Shakespeare's play underwent a metamorphosis in the 1990s, as a new generation of irreverent young directors began breaking with Shakespeare’s classical tradition in favour of contemporary interpretations which re-cast the play in the present, complete with new settings, modern costumes and radical approaches to casting.
Ever since then most Othello's have been black. Ira Aldridge was the first black actor ever to be cast in the role of the Moor back in 1826. ALTHOUGH ENGLISH PLAYWRIGHT William Shakespeare originally wrote the character of Othello as a black man, the role has traditionally been played by white actors in blackface, beginning with Richard Burbage in the first ever performance in London's Whitehall in November 1604.
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