Theater: Toothless Villain

OTHELLO by William Shakespeare

There is no doubt about the identity of the main character in Hamlet or Macbeth, Richard II Coriolanus. Othello, however, does not revolve around the noble Moor but around his henchman lago, who drives him to madness and murder. The most complete and absolute embodiment of evil in all of Shakespeare — and perhaps in all of literature — the character is a supreme challenge to any actor. A wrong reading will make him either baffling or comical, like an oily villain from the silent movies. Unfortunately for this otherwise fine production by the New York Shakespeare Festival, Richard Dreyfuss manages to make lago both.

An inventive movie actor, Dreyfuss has no stage presence at all. He seems to be a student of the shout-and-spit school of Shakespearean acting, and his lago lacks the subtle shadings that might have made him more than merely nasty. He might ruin his kid sister’s birthday party by popping all the balloons, but he could never cause Othello to throw away his pearl, his divine Desdemona.

Raul Julia’s Othello is fitfully convincing nonetheless, if a bit too weepy.

Frances Conroy, who plays a spirited and touching Desdemona, almost justifies his deadly jealousy. Her penultimate scene with her maid (Kaiulani Lee), in which she prepares for the death she half expects, fully captures the grand pathos of this difficult play. Wilford Leach has directed with style and taste, making the most of his Central Park setting.

Given a different lago, his production might have been not only competent, but memorable.