Othello may have just hit Broadway, but the future of seeing it on the silver screen — with Denzel Washington — looks promising, too.
The highly anticipated show starring Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal celebrated its official opening on Sunday. Last year, Washington told Australia’s Today about a number of projects he had coming up. Broadway‘s Othello was one of them, but so was the film version.
The play’s director, Kenny Leon, told The Hollywood Reporter on the red carpet at the Othello opening that there have “absolutely” already been talks about adapting the play into a film. Leon, who’s now worked with Washington on three projects (A Raisin in the Sun, Fences), added that he hopes Gyllenhaal could also return. “I would hope so, absolutely, that’s what I would hope would happen,” he said.
Leon went on to say he doesn’t know what Othello would look as a film, because it’s “two different art forms.” But regardless of the theatrical or cinematic approach, the story’s still “got to tell the same truth.” So, for now, “we’re trying to get this up first,” Leon said.
Since the show has been playing in previews since Feb. 24, Othello has made box office history. In its second week, the show broke the record for highest weekly gross for a Broadway play by earning $2.8 million in its second week.
The William Shakespeare play, set in “The Near Future,” sees Gyllenhaal’s Iago manipulate Denzel’s title character into thinking his wife, Desdemona (Molly Osborne), is having an affair, leading to tragedy. “It’s important for today because, for 100s of years, we’re still dealing with ourselves. Humanity is still struggling with itself,” Leon said about how the show is relevant today. “This play is about pure love but what happens to pure love when there’s rumors and lies and jealousy. And all that’s timely for every generation.”
Washington is also no stranger to Shakespeare. At 22 years old, he played Othello while a student at Fordham University. In 2005, he starred as Marcus Brutus in Broadway’s Julius Caesar and led the 2021 film The Tragedy of Macbeth.
Castmembers Osborne and Neal Bledsoe, who plays the Duke of Venice, are both game to reprise their roles in an Othello movie. “His Macbeth translated into the medium of film, so I think that this would do the same thing quite well,” Bledsoe said.
Othello is now playing at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre through June 8.
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