In fact Ira Aldridge was an African-American, born in New York in 1807, but otherwise the flyers were accurate. When it was announced that he was to play Othello at one of England\u2019s most prestigious theatres, a racist campaign was launched \u201cto annihilate him,\u201d said the Morning Post<\/em>. Satirical publication Figaro in London<\/em> urged patriots to \u201cdrive him from the stage\u201d that he was \u201cabout to defile\u201d and prevent the \u201csacrilege\u201d of a negro playing Othello. In the 19th-century the character was always played as a light-skinned Arab and the poet Coleridge wrote that to imagine \u201cthis beautiful Venetian girl falling in love with a veritable negro\u201d was \u201cmonstrous\u201d.<\/p>\n In his early teens Ira Aldridge had acted with the pioneering African Company in New York, but when they performed plays written by the Bard, including Richard III<\/em> and Hamlet<\/em>, the black actors were beaten up on the orders of rival theatre managers, derided and arrested. \u201cShakespeare described what was universal\u201d, Aldridge\u2019s first biographer protested, therefore \u201cmay there not be an Ethiopian Juliet to an Ethiopian Romeo?\u201d<\/p>\n The African Company\u2019s theatre was destroyed by fire. With the help of the visiting English star Henry Wallack, Ira Aldridge made his way to Britain and in 1825 became probably the first black actor to play Shakespeare in this country, performing Othello in London\u2019s docklands: it was \u201cone of the finest physical representations of bodily anguish we have ever witnessed,\u201d said the Public Ledger <\/em>review.<\/p>\n Aldridge quickly built a reputation touring Britain. He often played in cities with strong Abolitionist [of slavery] sympathies and did not disconnect Shakespeare from the contemporary world. One of his curtain-call speeches [to the audience as he took his bow after the show] began, \u201cOthello\u2019s occupation\u2019s gone! \u2013 Tis o\u2019er.\/The mask has fall\u2019n\u201d, and went on:<\/p>\n Through deserts wide the Negro strays alone Aldridge was honoured by the freed slaves\u2019 Republic of Haiti as \u201cthe first man of colour in the theatre\u201d.<\/p>\n This explains the hostility Aldridge faced in Covent Garden. Following a revolt in Jamaica there were demands that slavery be abolished in all British colonies, and the government was due to report in May 1833. So Aldridge\u2019s appearance in the capital became symbolic. The anti-Abolitionist lobby claimed the slave population lacked the intellectual capacity to look after themselves, and as \u201cproof\u201d showed politicians engravings \u201cexhibiting the merriment of colonial negroes\u201d. Although Ira\u2019s casting was coincidental (he was replacing the great Edmund Kean, who was fatally ill), the sight and sound of the African Roscius, as Aldridge was known [Roscius was a Roman actor who had been a slave], playing a great role on a hallowed stage defied that propaganda.<\/p>\n Aldridge did appear as Othello on 10 April 1833 and the press were predictably divided.\u00a0 The Standard <\/em>reported that Aldridge was \u201cwatched with an intense stillness, almost approaching to awe\u201d, and rewarded by \u201cunanimous applause, waving of hats, handkerchiefs &c., &c.\u201d But the Spectator<\/em> appraised him as if at a slave auction: \u201cgood voice\u201d, \u201cgood figure\u201d, \u201cwe have seen better-looking Africans\u201d, \u201ctame\u201d.<\/p>\n The Athenaeum<\/em>, meanwhile, insisted it was impossible that such a savage \u201cshould comprehend the meaning and force of even the words he utters\u201d, and raised the spectre of miscegenation: \u201cWe protest against an interesting actress and lady-like girl, like Miss Ellen Tree,[\u2026] being pawed about by Mr Henry Wallack\u2019s black servant\u201d [Wallack was a comedy actor who had helped Aldridge get to London, and so hostile writers claimed Aldridge was merely his servant]. Aldridge\u2019s engagement was cut short.<\/p>\n Aldridge was never allowed on the Covent Garden stage again and for a century this effectively eliminated him from the official histories of Shakespeare, which focused on the \u2018main\u2019 theatres. However Aldridge, rejected by the establishment, was embraced by radicals and working-class audiences: within days he crossed the Thames to the Surrey Theatre in Lambeth, where posters celebrated the scale of his achievements: \u201cA man of colour performing Othello, on the British stage, is indeed an epoch in the history of theatricals\u201d. Slavery in the colonies was abolished in August.<\/p>\n In 1833 Ira Aldridge was seen as either a pariah or a hero, but perhaps an earlier episode offers a more subtle picture of the role of the theatre in the history of race relations\u2026<\/p>\n Back in 1828, Aldridge was still making his name. The manager of theatres in both Birmingham and Coventry, Mr Melmoth, decided that an \u201cAfrican Roscius\u201d was a marketable curiosity: \u201cMost Extraordinary Novelty, a Man of Colour\u201d. That January he first presented Aldridge at Birmingham in the musical melodrama The Slave<\/em>, soon followed by Othello<\/em>. The theatre was usually closed after Christmas and houses were thin, but the press had a story to tell. \u201cWe were greatly astonished,\u201d said the Birmingham Gazette<\/em>. \u201cWe were totally unprepared to meet with a performer\u201d who could challenge criticism at the highest level \u2013 who \u201cpossesses a voice\u2026 as fine, flexible and manly, as any on the London stage\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cHis display of intellectual power,\u201d said the Coventry Herald<\/em>, \u201cgives the negative to those physiologists who argue for the inferiority of dark races\u201d. Actually the Herald printed \u201csuperiority\u201d by mistake but after a run of acclaimed performances it made amends with a social invitation to the \u201cman of colour\u201d: \u201cShould he appear in town, as we are told he intends to do, as a stranger and foreigner we heartily wish him success\u201d.<\/p>\n Aldridge did appear in town and was very well received. By the end of February 1828 \u2013 with slavery still flourishing in the colonies and in the USA \u2013 Ira Aldridge was the manager of the Coventry Theatre. He was not yet 21.<\/p>\n Yet even while Aldridge\u2019s performances were being praised, Melmoth\u2019s management was attacked for bad planning, poor casting and non-existent rehearsals; he left under a financial cloud. Aldridge promised to improve standards in every department, with \u201ca settled company\u201d of \u201cnew performers and old favourites,\u201d and he delivered. His season opened with Othello<\/em> (\u201cconsiderable discrimination and effect,\u201d said the Coventry Herald<\/em>) and was a great success.<\/p>\n Years passed. In 1852 Aldridge began to tour Continental Europe with a repertoire that by now also included (in makeup designed to make him look white) Macbeth, Lear and Shylock. He was a sensation, especially because he was often introducing then-unknown Shakespearean plays. He appeared before crowned heads; he was knighted in Germany; banned in Russia (Macbeth<\/em><\/a> offended the Tsar because it dealt with regicide \u2013 the deliberate killing of a monarch) and he influenced a new generation of actors and theatre reformers. In Germany Aldridge told a journalist that \u201che understands like no other how to portray\u2026 the full bitterness the Jew feels\u201d.<\/p>\n![\""Painting\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2018\/01\/Ira20Aldridge20as20Othello-fac34a0.jpg?quality=90&resize=304%2C413"\" "\\"\"Ira\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div> Aldridge was never allowed on the Covent Garden stage again and effectively eliminated from the official histories of Shakespeare <\/blockquote> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n<\/div>
![\""Ira\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2018\/01\/Ira20Aldridge20c1826-ea22040.jpg?quality=90&resize=328%2C413"\" "\\"\"Ira\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>Aldridge in Coventry<\/strong><\/h3>\n