Othello begins with a call for silence and ends with a plea to speak. It ends in a plea to tell stories, speak the truth, and be honest. The Braided Project engages with Othello as a race play, specifically focusing on moments in history when its performance was racialized. It discusses three turning points in the way Othello was analyzed and performed. These periods show the morphing political nature of Othello, and its power to influence perceptions of race. It was written in conjunction with a filmed performance of Othello that incorporates the play's history in order to show the contemporary relevance of the play. First, it discusses the Nineteenth Century blackface productions of Othello, and the debate over whether Othello was light-skinned Moor or a \"veritable negro\". This distinction was the difference between an Othello with internal psychological struggles, who was closer to Whiteness, and a dark gorilla-like figure who give into his passionate rage. This section examines the scientific and political context that surrounded these two analyses. It focuses on how Othello's coloring impacted other choices during the performance. The next chapter is about the integration of Black actors into White productions of Othello. This chapter spans the century (1822-1943) between the first Black actor to play Othello in an all-Black cast and the first integrated performance of Othello in the United States. It discusses the reactions to these integrated performances, and the platform granted to the actors who managed to cross the color-barrier. Finally, it argues that Othello became a uniquely American story leading up to the Civil Rights Movement, which led to a rift between British and American performances of the play. Chapter three is about contemporary adaptations of Othello. It analyzes three adaptations written by Black playwrights. The chapter compares and contrasts their understandings of Othello, and their motives for engaging with a controversial play. This chapter shows how the analysis surrounding Othello changed once Black scholars gained legitimacy in academic and artistic discussions of the play. Finally, chapter four is about the process of making this play right now. It details how I adapted the play to fit our contemporary context and to highlight characters who were not given voice. Unlike many analyses of Shakespeare's plays, this is not a deep dive into the play and the language Shakespeare employed. This thesis is an analysis of how different actors, directors, writers, and scholars interpreted the play over its four-hundred-year history. It is close read of performance of the play, not of the play itself; however, these two facets are necessarily intertwined. Because Othello centers the still complex topics of interracial marriage and Black representation, the history of the play is as much a part of it as the language itself. Thus, The Braided Project studies Othello through how it is perceived both through writing and performance, not strictly the words on the page.
"},{"label":"Degree","value":["Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors"]},{"label":"Author-supplied Keywords","value":["Race","Shakespeare","Inclusion"]},{"label":"Administrative Note","value":"Drupal Node ID: 24260