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The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 12.2896  Thursday, 27 December 2001

From:           Charles Weinstein <Proteus6847@msn.com>
Date:           Saturday, 22 Dec 2001 15:38:58 -0500
Subject:        Trends in Postmodern Shakespearean Performance--Iago in the
A.R.T.'s Othello

Regional productions are often of regional interest only, but sometimes
they raise issues of wider significance.  Othello, currently on view at
Bob Brustein’s American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts,
is such a production.  Let’s begin with the performance of Iago.

The Ensign is played by Thomas Derrah, a “tenured” member of the A.R.T.
(he’s been with the company for over 20 years).  Derrah has won a good
deal of local acclaim for his comic and farcical performances, and his
face, physique and temperament are ideally suited to such roles:  he’s
tiny, bald, round-faced, snub-nosed and possessed of a genuinely sweet
disposition.  One would not normally think of him as Iago, but ours is
an age that confounds or ignores distinctions, and so we have Derrah, a
born farceur, playing the most profoundly evil character in all of
Shakespeare.  To darken his appearance, Derrah has grown or applied a
beard:  he now looks like a tiny, bald, round-faced, snub-nosed, bearded
comic actor.

In truth Derrah is seriously miscast.  He surely knows this, for he
doesn’t know his lines.  Aside from flubs, fluffs and gaping
hesitations, his speeches are peppered with paraphrases, transpositions
and strange verbal metamorphoses.  (In the Temptation Scene, “foul
disproportion” becomes “foul disappropriation,” which makes a lot of
sense, while “mandragora” turns into “mandragola,” which sounds like a
cooking oil.)  Nor is this a matter of first- or second-night jitters;
by the time I saw him, Derrah had been playing Iago for a solid week.
That a major repertory actor playing a great Shakespearean role should
fail to know his lines is a scandal--or would be, if any of the local
reviewers had commented on it.  They haven’t, either because they are
too ignorant to perceive the extent of Derrah’s unprofessionalism, or
because they are giving him a free pass in deference to his prior
successes.  If the latter is the case, their ill-judged generosity
extends to the Director, Dramaturg and Artistic Director, all of whom
should certainly have whipped Derrah into shape.

However, Derrah’s problems with Iago go far beyond his insecurity with
the lines.  He seems weirdly disconnected from the role throughout.
This disconnection extends to the other characters and to the play
itself, none of which seems to register upon his sensibilities.  There
is an airy, weightless, floating quality to his performance:  he clearly
lacks the solidity for hatred and often seems to be doing comic turns in
a vacuum.  He mugs his way through the Temptation Scene, deploying
expressions of mock-horror that would not fool even the most credulous
of interlocutors.  Even worse, Derrah treats his assignment as a grand
excuse for Camping It Up, swishing about the stage so blatantly that one
wonders why Othello would choose this man for a soldier, let alone his
Ensign.  Perhaps Derrah’s flitting and flaming represent his strangely
exaggerated efforts to present a gay Iago; but I think that the
explanation lies elsewhere.  Miscast and knowing it, unable to identify
with Iago and transform himself accordingly, careless of reprisals to
the point of not learning his lines, Derrah simply hasn’t bothered to
subdue or tone down his own homosexuality in order to give an honest
performance.

And out of this don’t-give-a-fuck attitude an interpretation of sorts
begins to emerge.  Since Derrah doesn’t care about his role or the play,
his Iago likewise seems to care about nothing--not his promotion, not
Emilia’s fidelity, not his subordination to Cassio, not even Othello’s
provoking successes in love and war.  This is Iago as metatheatrical
nihilist.  He doesn’t hate Othello and Desdemona; he simply doesn’t
believe in them.  Their love withers in the presence of his
light-hearted skepticism.  Derrah may not have “intended” this effect;
but he probably senses it and, faute de mieux, sanctions it.

Has one seen this before?  Indeed one has.  Fiona Shaw’s Richard II was
also a joke performance, deliberately sending up the world of the play
with all its foolish masculine values.  Whether skipping about the stage
like Peter Pan, delivering her lines with comic exaggeration, or
pretending to cower behind her throne before popping out with an
“only-kidding” grin, Ms.  Shaw’s every action seemed to proclaim the
idiocy of kingship, men and Shakespeare’s play.  Postmodernists love
this sort of thing; and I admit that it can be fascinating for about a
half-hour.  It may even have a certain apparent rightness.  Richard II
was unfit to be a king; Fiona Shaw was unfit to play Richard; why
shouldn’t the actor stand outside her role and mock her own miscasting?
Iago is (arguably) a gay jokester who (inarguably) believes in no
positive human values; Derrah is a gay comedian unable to connect with
high tragedy; why shouldn’t the actor treat his assignment as a camp
charade?

These questions are ultimately rhetorical, since one cannot sustain a
three-hour performance on the energy of condescension alone.  Once the
novelty of subversion wears off, the audience begins to long for some
seriousness and commitment from the actor.  Instead they are given
repeated servings of triviality, fatuity and inconsequence.  As the play
increases in narrative urgency, dramatic pressure and tragic depth, the
postmodern actor continues to float, skip and dither through the
proceedings, a graffito being scrawled over a masterpiece.  The other
actors, unaware of the joke or unamused by it, struggle valiantly to
give genuine performances even as their would-be colleague renders their
efforts useless.  (Michael Bryant, who played York in the Fiona Shaw
Richard, was visibly unhappy with the production and could do nothing
with his potentially rich supporting role.)  A cloud of disgust and
resignation settles over the audience.  If the actor doesn’t care, why
should they?  And if that’s the point, why bother to attend the
performance?  Better to stay at home, save their money and drive the
theater company into the non-existence that it seems to crave.

There is nothing more to say, except that Derrah’s fey meanderings make
even less sense with the obsessively-scheming Iago than they might with
another character.  If the Ensign truly cares about nothing, he would
hardly possess the energy, will and attention-span to formulate his
plots, let alone follow through on them.  One half-expects Derrah’s Iago
to cry “April Fool!” some three minutes into the Temptation Scene before
dancing away with a giggle.  And what’s he then that says he plays the
villain?  No one at all, I’m afraid.

--Charles Weinstein

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