Desdemona - Performance History

Performance History

Desdemona's first interpreter was most certainly a boy actor with a singing voice.

On December 8, 1660, Thomas Killigrew's new King's Company acted Othello at their Vere Street theatre, with Margaret Hughes as Desdemona — possibly the first time a professional actress appeared on a public stage in England. She certainly played Desdemona in the performance of Othello seen by Samuel Pepys on February 6, 1669.

Pepys was present for a performance of Othello at the Cockpit on October 11, 1660, noting in his diary: "a pretty lady that sat by me called out to see Desdemona smothered."

In the eighteenth century, the play was sometimes cut to heighten the tragic nobility of the protagonist. Bell's acting version, for example, omitted several moments including Desdemona's conversation with Emilia before her death—a death which is accomplished in Bells' version by stabbing rather than suffocation.

In the nineteenth century, behind-the-scenes events in the lives of the play's performers garnered for Othello a shocking and sensational reputation. Charles Kean, for example, suffered a bitter divorce in 1825, and, in 1833, collapsed following a performance of the play, dying shortly thereafter. Edwin Forrest filed for divorce on the grounds of adultery only to be found guilty himself and ordered to pay alimony. Ira Aldridge, an American black actor who appeared in the role, married a white woman. Such events cultivated the play's shocking and sensational reputation, and Tommaso Salvini's savage and sensual performance only enhanced it. In his rendition, Desdemona's death was an especially violent affair. Further cultivating the drama's reputation were the performances of Sarah Siddons, Anna Mowatt, and Ellen Terry who all played the melodramatic role of womanly innocence traduced and overwhelmed to the hilt.

In 1839, Samuel Phelps and William Charles Macready alternated in the roles of Othello and Iago at the Haymarket Theatre with Helen Faucit in the role of Desdemona. In 1881, Ellen Terry performed the role at London's Lyceum Theatre with Edwin Booth and Henry Irving alternating in the roles of Othello and Iago. The production was a great artistic and financial success.

In the twentieth century, Peggy Ashcroft played the character opposite Paul Robeson in London's Savoy Theatre in 1930, and Uta Hagen appeared in the role opposite Robeson in Margaret Webster's production at the Shubert Theatre in New York City in 1943.

In cinema, Suzanne Cloutier played Desdemona opposite Orson Welles in a version that won the Palme D'Or at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival. In a 1966 film which holds the record for the most Academy Award nominations given to a Shakespeare film, Maggie Smith played the character opposite Laurence Olivier. Smith and co-stars Olivier, Frank Finlay (Iago), and Joyce Redman (Emilia) all received acting nominations. Irène Jacob played the character in a 1995 film opposite Laurence Fishburne. In O (2001), Julia Stiles played a character based on Desdemona in a version of the play set in a contemporary high school. In 2006, Omkara (film), the Bollywood version of Othello, Desdemona née Dolly Mishra was played by Kareena Kapoor.