137. Dr. Wüllner as Othello

Guest performance at the Court Theater, Weimar

The person who first explained the greatness of Shakespeare's dramas from the fact that their poet was an actor had a happy, illuminating idea. It is less important that this poet practiced the art of acting professionally than that he was, by his very nature, an actor. It is part of the essence of such a nature that it can, with complete denial of its own personality, immerse itself in other characters. The actor renounces being himself. He is given the opportunity to speak out of other beings. And the more malleable, the more transformable he is, the more of an actor he is. It has a deeply symbolic meaning that we know next to nothing about Shakespeare as a person. What is he to us as a person? He does not speak to us as a person; he speaks to us in roles. He is the true chameleon. He speaks to us as Hamlet, as Lear, as Othello. Shakespeare plays theater, even when he writes plays. He no longer feels what is going on in his soul when he creates the characters in his plays. Because Shakespeare was only an actor, his plays can only be performed by real actors. It will always be the sign of an actor's deficiency if his art fails in Shakespeare's dramas.

These thoughts crossed my mind last Sunday when I saw Mr. Wüllner's Othello. I couldn't shake off a certain impatience throughout the performance. I wanted to see Othello and all I saw all evening was Mr. Wüllner. I wanted to understand how Othello could gradually fall into this terrible rage of jealousy, and I only got to know the feelings that dominate Mr. Wüllner when he looks at Othello. Mr. Wüllner has not the power of self-expression which makes the true actor. At every moment he lets us see to the bottom of his own being.

Do not be unfair to Mr. Wüllner. His art is no small one. He has a great command of his means of expression, he is a master of the nuances of acting. There are many things to praise. But it is annoying when you see such art applied where the main point is missed.

Mr. Wüllner used to be a learned philologist. I think I recognize the scholar in the actor. The scholar lacks the ability to slip into the unknown; he only observes it, he usually just ponders it. And Mr. Wüllner did not play Othello, he played about Othello. He played what he pondered about Othello. But what does the audience care what Mr. Wüllner feels about Othello, no matter how vividly it is felt. I would rather see Mr. Wüllner's feelings and thoughts about the character of Othello set down in a literary work than acted on the stage. I have no doubt that such a work would be interesting. But I am not interested in interesting doctrines on the stage. They don't seem interesting there. It was therefore boring and tiring to watch Mr. Wüllner's Othello to the end. To portray a character in such a way that he stands there as if from a single mould, that the spectator has the feeling with every word, with every gesture, with every step, that all this must be so: this, it seems, Mr. Wüllner cannot do. With every detail one has the feeling that it could be different without changing anything as a whole. Mr. Wüllner offered a mosaic of acting nuances, not a uniform character. His art lacks style. It seems mannered. It represents the flip side of good acting. It denies everything that makes good actors great. Mr. Wüllner cannot eradicate the "doctor" in himself.