(seen at the afternoon performance on 28th January 2023)
Two productions of “Othello” in a month, a good thing it is the monkey’s favourite Bill The Quill effort. The title may be the same, but compared to this Frantic Assembly version first developed in 2008 by a company dedicated to bringing theatre where there is none, the National’s recent effort seems staid.
Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett have adapted the script by stripping out entirely the military aspect and focussing on bonding between characters. The setting is a dodgy pub “The Cypress,” the protagonists a loose gang of young friends against the world. Their relationships are everything, friendship itself even more so.
A mixture of words and stylised movement for which Frantic Assembly are pioneers has Laura Hopkins designed pub walls become pliable with emotion, a fruit machine blinking a warning and a pool table for a bed light and dark. We get convincing alleyways and a surprisingly graffiti-free pub toilet too.
To a soundtrack of beats by Hybrid, Scott Graham marshals an unlikely crew. Michael Akinsulire in the title role is the gang leader to whom all defer. Slightly uneven in character due to the chosen text revisions, there are moments when this champion of his housing estate seems older and detached, though his pain and confusion are real. That he deals with a slightly peculiarly staged suicide is also to his credit.
Akinsurlire’s Desdemona, Chanel Waddock, plays on two notes – the chief’s girlfriend, thus untouchable, and the insecure young woman vulnerable without his protection. Her barriers against intimacy with anybody are a different approach, and if her death perhaps lacked muscle control, the ability to lie at an awkward angle centre-stage for a prolonged scene is an achievement.
As Emilia, friend and confidant, Kirsty Stuart’s nicely timed asides stand out almost as much as a murder so shockingly gruesome even the monkey spontaneously gasped aloud.
Third lady always in Othello, Hannah Sinclair Robinson’s Bianca is hugely successful, proud with a necessary self-protective edge.
Joe Layton as Iago not only gets the best lines in the play, but also the most convincing role in this adaptation from speeches to baseball cap costume. Well delivered and neatly both manipulating dupe Roderigo (Felipe Pacheco – a fine energetic turn) and victim Cassio (Tom Gill, integrity personified).
The monkey has no doubt that had Shakespeare himself seen this production, he would be setting down his quill to rub his hands with glee at the box office potential. The Old Swan was in the entertainment business – the mass entertainment business – needing to reach and satisfy as many customers as possible by appealing to every level of taste.
Frantic Assembly fulfil this remit perfectly. It may have rough edges for those familiar with the work, but nobody can argue with the originality of the angle nor the vitality and inventiveness on display. Put money in their purse.
4 stars.
Photo credit: © Tristram Kenton. Used by kind permission of the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith.