Othello directed by Tom Morris opens with a stately display of scarlet costumes and gilded doorways arranged against a backdrop of black nothingness. This is Venice at night with no hint of sea or sunshine. Crimson-robed senators gather to discuss Othello’s alleged abduction of Brabantio’s daughter. And here he comes, David Harewood as the Moor, wearing a gauche two-tone suit like a tasteless guest at a wedding. The scene is stiff, arid and over-ornate but the show opens up when the location shifts to Cyprus. Warmth and light fill the stage and the costumes improve. Othello and his men wear creamy white battle fatigues that look stylishly and subtly masculine.

Toby Jones (Iago) is too petite to play a warrior at a time when hand-to-hand combat was part of every soldier’s repertoire but his impish persona makes up for it. That squashy pug-dog face is maddeningly and wonderfully hard to read. Is he a harmless nobody or a monster plotting atrocities from behind a mask of blandness? Great casting. This is a persistently cold and unpleasant Iago. His moments of cheeky banter with Desdemona have been side-lined, and he doesn’t mention his suspicion that Othello seduced his wife, Emilia.

This deletes a key ingredient from his enmity towards the Moor and........

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