Denzel Washington could also be bringing his model of “Othello” to the display screen.
Washington stars alongside Jake Gyllenhaal within the Broadway play, which has been in previews since February 24. “Othello” opened March 23 and runs by June 8. The play already broke the report for the best weekly gross ever by incomes $2.8 million in its second week. Now, director Kenny Leon is teasing that the historic Shakespeare retelling may result in a movie.
Leon advised The Hollywood Reporter that there has “completely” been talks with Washington about adapting the play right into a characteristic. Leon beforehand has collaborated with Washington on two different performs, “A Raisin within the Solar” and “Fences,” which Washington then later directed the movie model of. When requested if Gyllenhaal would additionally doubtlessly reprise his function for an “Othello” movie, Leon stated, “I might hope so, completely, that’s what I might hope would occur.”
Leon’s “Othello” is about in “The Close to Future,” with Iago (Gyllenhaal) manipulating the titular Othello (Washington) into considering that his spouse, Desdemona (Molly Osborne), is having an affair. That is the primary Broadway manufacturing of “Othello” in additional than 40 years, although Daniel Craig and David Oyelowo co-starred in a staging at New York Theatre Workshop off-Broadway between 2016 and 2017.
“It’s necessary for at the moment as a result of, for 100s of years, we’re nonetheless coping with ourselves. Humanity remains to be combating itself,” Leon stated. “This play is about pure love however what occurs to pure love when there’s rumors and lies and jealousy. And all that’s well timed for each technology.”
He added {that a} play and a movie are “two completely different artwork types” however the story of “Othello” can have “the identical fact” in both type. “We’re making an attempt to get this up first,” Leon stated of the play.
The Selection overview cited the respective star energy of Washington and Gyllenhaal onstage. “These scenes capitalize on all 70 of Washington’s years on this Earth, as he looms over Desdemona and speaks with an authority his misguided beliefs haven’t earned,” the overview reads. “That Washingtonian authority demonstrates the manufacturing’s one huge concept — to put two huge stars on the middle of the stage and belief that their expertise and charisma will carry the day. And, for probably the most half, they do; no fan of Washington or of Gyllenhaal will go away disenchanted within the actors. Leon lets his two stars cook dinner, however hasn’t stocked the manufacturing with something to offer what they’re doing any taste.”
Washington just lately led one other Shakespeare movie adaptation, Joel Coen’s 2021 characteristic “The Tragedy of Macbeth.” He’ll subsequent star in Spike Lee’s “Highest 2 Lowest.”
“Othello” has been delivered to the display screen earlier than, most (in)famously with the 1965 model which starred Laurence Olivier because the titular character. Olivier obtained an Oscar nomination for his efficiency; nevertheless, he was in blackface to play Othello.