Katanga, Iago!

August 30, 2008 10:35 AM

When a top black entertainer reaches 50, of course he's going to want to add The Moor to his repertoire...

No, it's not him... really

posted by fearfulsymmetry (14 comments total)

Prince is going to play Othello?
posted by jouke at 12:01 PM on August 30, 2008

The reaches 50 link goes to the second page of the article. Just saying in case it wasn't intentional.
posted by an egg at 12:07 PM on August 30, 2008

Morgan Freeman is co-starring in Robin Hood again?
posted by blue_beetle at 12:11 PM on August 30, 2008

Only if he does it the style of Theophilis P. Wildebeest, otherwise I'm not interested. And even then I'm not interested.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 12:33 PM on August 30, 2008

!

I'd actually be interested in seeing that. If only to get more exposure for him. I'm always a little surprised by how few people here recognise his name.

...would his humour be included at all, I wonder? He seems pretty irrepressible in that respect, and that could make for either a fabulous twist or some very uncomfortable moments. I'm game, either way.
posted by batmonkey at 12:50 PM on August 30, 2008

Derail: Lenny Henry's reading of Neil Gaiman's "Anansi Boys" is one of my favourite audiobooks.
posted by nowonmai at 1:35 PM on August 30, 2008

Othello is playing at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival this year. We saw it last week and it's awesome. Although this year's best play (of the four that we saw) is Coriolanus.
posted by neuron at 1:37 PM on August 30, 2008

I'm always a little surprised by how few people here recognise his name.

If he'd said Chef! was going to play Othello, I would have known who he meant, but i suspect most people in the US would have thought of Isaac Hayes.
posted by doctor_negative at 1:37 PM on August 30, 2008

When he was interviewed on Front Row about this, he fell back on his 'amusing' Dudley and Jamaican accents so much I was forced to switch off the radio. This doesn't bode well, though I suppose it makes sense for a performer who isn't funny anymore (though he definitely used to be - Delbert Wilkins was a great character).

Also, I'm really surprised that the Wikipedia entry doesn't mention his five year stint in the Black & White Minstrel Show. That seems like a pretty interesting, possibly revealing fact about a black comedian, most of whom don't tend to black up.
posted by jack_mo at 1:40 PM on August 30, 2008

Er, there was a '...to try his hand at drama' at the end of that first paragraph, I swear.
posted by jack_mo at 1:41 PM on August 30, 2008

I saw Eomonn Walker as Othello last year at The Globe. He was excellent and Tim McInnerny was even better as Iago.
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:22 PM on August 30, 2008

Also, I'm really surprised that the Wikipedia entry doesn't mention his five year stint in the Black & White Minstrel Show.

Everything2 has a less sanitized account of his career.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 4:30 PM on August 30, 2008

As does "100 Great, Black Britons".
posted by batmonkey at 7:06 PM on August 30, 2008

Whatever he does with it (and I like Lenny Henry), it's almost certainly going to come off as second-rate in comparison to Chiwetel Ejiofor's 2007 Othello.
posted by Sidhedevil at 11:35 AM on August 31, 2008