Upon entry, theatergoers at the new Broadway revival of “Othello,” starring Denzel Washington as Othello and Jake Gyllenhaal as Iago, are required to place their phones in locked Yondr pouches — a precaution that seems to have received more careful direction than the performances onstage.
During previews, the show raked in $2.8 million in ticket sales in a single week, setting a new record for the highest weekly box office gross by a play in Broadway history. According to the Broadway League, the average paid admission that week was $338, while tickets ranged from $197 to $497, with premium tickets going for $897.
This led to a press release, news articles, and a new round of pearl-clutching about the ever-escalating cost of top tickets to the most exclusive Broadway shows. However, the ticket price is likely not a matter of greed on the part of the show’s producers so much as the plain reality of commercial Broadway producing.
Producers need to charge as much as they can to break even financially while producing a play with big stars, who command large salaries and only agree to appear for a limited number of weeks.
If you are interested in seeing “Othello” and have the financial means to do so, by all means, go for it. If not, don’t worry. The 400-year-old play is in the public domain. You can access the text online or at the library, in addition to various previously recorded stage productions and film adaptations.
But how exactly is the new Broadway production? It’s okay, at best – a pedestrian, cheap-looking, uninspired, forgettable staging that is far from the train wreck of Peter Sellars’ experimental, four-hour 2009 Off-Broadway production with Philip Seymour Hoffman as Iago, or Theatre for a New Audience’s exceptional Off-Broadway production, also from 2009, with John Douglas Thompson as Othello.
Purportedly set in 2028, the production (directed by the ever-busy Kenny Leon) uses modern dress (including business suits and military garb), a black-and-gray color scheme, and a few column-like set pieces. The only scene that feels dramatically grounded is the vigorous partying sequence in which Iago plots to get his rival Cassio drunk.
A major problem is Washington’s half-baked performance. While he is fine at first as a stately military leader and relaxed new husband, he does not credibly convey the character’s transformation into mad jealousy and suspicion, reducing it to something vaguely kooky and unthreatening. He also displays little chemistry with Molly Osborne’s dignified, proactive Desdemona.
Gyllenhaal, with a shaved head, is a capable and physical Iago, though his attempts to depict the character as unsure and vulnerable during private soliloquies are unconvincing
I was looking forward to the production – not just because of the track records of Washington and Gyllenhaal (who have both given excellent performances on Broadway in recent years) and Leon (who helmed a stunning production of “Our Town” at the same theater earlier this season).
“Othello” is a play about the dangers of misinformation and mistrust as engineered by an exceptionally persuasive orator. It should speak directly to this cultural moment. Instead, it’s a hollow star vehicle – expensive but cheap, flashy but dull.
Even with phones locked away, this starry “Othello” can’t seem to ring true.
Barrymore Theatre, 243 West 47th St., othellobway.com. Through June 8.
