Othello

I see before me a "divided duty". As a performance, I would give this production five stars: the globe theatre is amazing, the costumes and staging is authentic, and the performances are riveting. Unfortunately, I purchased this dvd set precisely for use in the classroom, and there's the rub. Technically, I cannot use this dvd set in my classroom because it's in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act due to the fact that Kurtur (the publisher) does not provide closed captions for the performance. For those who are not in a teaching environment, this may not seem like a big deal, but the lack of captions means that I literally cannot even put this disc on reserve at my library. If it is not equally accessible to all students, regardless of ability or handicap, it is a violation of federal law to use it. I consider this a massive oversight on the part of Kultur and Shakespeare's Globe and a self-imposed injury. I give the 2-disk set 5 stars for the performance, and 1 star for its value as an educational resource, and that's tragic.

The main attraction here is the recreated Globe Theater itself. And this production makes good use of this marvelous stage. Nice camera work -- sometimes, briefly, the camera moves to the back of the stage -- and we see the actors from above and behind, and we see audience reactions. Eamonn Walker is a fine, powerful Othello, if a bit too young. Tim McInnery's Iago is perhaps the weakest part of the production. With all his boisterousness and shouting, he doesn't really convey the subtle evil the role requires. The Desdemona is fine -- and the Emelia's feisty performance surprised me -- but it works very well.

The play is pretty good, but the audience interaction is overwhelmingly distracting. People coming and going is annoying enough, but the wildly inappropriate laughter smattered throughout ruins scenes that are rather well acted and, of course, brilliantly written.

I had the chance to see this performance live, and it is just as compelling on video. Iago is charming and repugnant. Othello is tender, jealous, and brutal. There is a bewildering mix of humor and tragedy that is simply impossible to capture in a movie. If you can find a copy, buy it.

I bought this for my high school classroom because I wasn't sure about other versions/adaptations. It is tremendously well-acted and students loved seeing what they had read. Scenes are individually accessible via the Table of Contents, which helped with student comprehension if one of the scenes were particularly difficult to envision.Unfortunately, there aren't subtitles but that's the only downside.

Eamonn Walker is a magnificent Othello. Powerfully built with the strong, masculine presence that the character of Othello requires, Walker also has a beautifully emotive face, and eyes that give away so much of the character's heart. Really, the best Othello I've seen.Other reviewers have problems with things that did not bother me at all - When Iago is not the center of the action, McInnerny will sometimes give a dull, slack-jawed look. My interpretation of this is that any time Iago speaks, any time a character looks at him, he is performing. But this face - the dull, empty, calculating face - is his true one. It's an interesting choice, I think. Some reviewers complained that the director had turned the play into a comedy, but Shakespeare's work always contains comedic elements, comedy or no. It's just the way he wrote, and is a technique still used by filmmakers and playwrights today - you build tension, then you break tension (which is where the comedy comes in), so that you can build it again. The lines are Shakespeare's, this is just a different interpretation than we've previously seen, and a successful one, I think.Some things I did have a problem with - the actress who plays Desdemona makes one terrible misstep early in the production (a long slow look around the room). These moments of really bad acting (or directing, although none of us can tell whose fault it is) serve to remind the audience - this is not Desdemona, this is a woman who is being paid to pretend she's Desdemona for a couple hours, and then she'll go home and put on her yoga pants and have some tea. Not a great way to suck your audience into a story. She otherwise gave a lovely and delightful performance, but it took a little while to recover from that initial bobble.And the biggest problem - and I feel like such a jerk for saying this - the two black actresses. It's not about them, it's about the story. All choices the director makes should be to serve the story. These two ladies were both really good actors, and I would love to see them in something else, but these roles need to be filled by white actors, not black. If there are other mixed-race marriages in this play, then why is it such a big deal when Othello and Desdemona marry? If there are other black characters in this city, then why is Othello himself considered such an exotic character? To complain about these lovely and talented women is not to make a racist statement. It's to complain that the story was not served.All this leads to my request for more special features. In the brief "documentary," the director talks about what he wanted in doing the production, and he talks about how some of the stars were cast, and... that's it. I wanted to know more about Eamonn Walker, to fulfill my slight movie star crush, but mostly I wanted to know why he chose the two black lady actors - what his intention was in making that decision. Alas. Alackaday.

Seeing a live performance adds more excitement and immediacy. The viewer is forced to deal with the realities of live theatre. There aren't any studio microphones, so the actors really need to project their voices. I find that with repeated viewings I absorb and understand more and more of the text.I don't have any negative comments. Shakespeare's Othello really offers a keen insight into racist and sexist attitudes in 16th century Britain.

As a high school English teacher I found this DVD to be a wonderful teaching tool. Telling the kids how Shakespearean plays are staged does not make the same impact as actually seeing it--not to mention it improves comprehension when they see/hear the play (especially on the Globe stage) instead of just reading it off the paper.Having said that... this play is great for nerds like me, but if you're looking for Hollywood fluff for entertainment value, look elsewhere (I recommend the Lawrence Fishborne version). This is the whole play and nothing but the play.There are other reviews who criticized the acting/specific actors--to them I say this is a wonderful SHAKESPEAREAN performance, in all its pomp and circumstance; overacting comes with the territory.

A beautifully executed performance. Very moving.