Compared with Gabriel Chamé Buendia’s extraordinary comic version of the Shakespeare tragedy last season, aside from its brevity and the initial appearance of Desdemona on roller skates, there was little to recommend Les Antonietes’ serious and straightforward reading of Othello. It, despite the claims on the promotional material, did little to place the play in a contemporary context. 

Centred on the top three characters – Othello, his wife Desdemona and servant Iago – just a few hints from the latter, centred on much word play on the one-letter difference between ‘puta’ (bitch or prostitute) and ‘pura’ (pure), were enough to completely unravel the Moor. This seemed much to Iago’s own surprise, although Othello offered little grandeur and authority as a political leader, let alone as a military might. 

Desdemona herself, a rather flat character in Shakespeare, was portrayed here as a fresh carefree beauty much younger than her husband; an innocent that deserved to be looked after, whose attempt to please Othello with a blowjob – something not included in the original play – offered a vision of modern woman that one hopes was ironic.