Desdemona is a powerful contemporary play by Toni Morrison (Script), Rokia Traoré (Music), and Peter Sellars (Direction). In this collaborative effort, Morrison gives Desdemona from Othello, a more deserving titular role. Desdemona explores her life before and after the events of Othello. She is brought up by an abusive mother who locked her up in a cage. A new character who wasn’t in Othello was added by Morrison. Emilia is an African American maid who has always been beside Desdemona, as her aid. Together with other colored maids in the play, they discreetly criticize Desdemona as naive, ignorant, and privileged. In truth, Desdemona is portrayed as an adult woman who is confident and outspoken despite her flaws.
The writing is beautiful and magnificent like a lyric, thanks to Traoré’s songwriting skills. The speech is short and precise. The songs are emotionally evocative and complex. The play defies the traditional forms of play and follows the contemporary movement of less narrative and more spontaneous performances. At the beginning of the play, Desdemona says her name means misery and doom. She proclaims that she is not, in any fashion the meaning of a word she did not choose.
Desdemona is not a play about Desdemona as the wife of Othello, rather her own life experiences from childhood to adulthood and finally her death. This play-acts as a way to offer characters that previously didn’t have a voice, to now stand on their own and tell their story proudly. Women are championed all across the board for their hard work and sacrifice. Themes of love, marriage, feminism, society, racism, and slavery. The play is poignant and amazing, always leaving you thirsting for more.
