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Interview: "This is Us, Which is Ugly": A Merchant for Here and Now Arin Arbus and John Douglas Thompson in Conversation with Ayanna Thompson
INTERVIEW "THIS IS US, WHICH IS UGLY": A MERCHANT FOR HERE AND NOW
Shirine Babb (Nerissa), Graham Winton (Salerio), John Douglas Thompson (Shylock), Sanjit De Silva (Bassanio), Alfredo Narciso (Antonio), Nate Miller (Jailer). Photo by Henry Grossman.
Midway through rehearsals for The Merchant of Venice, Ayanna Thompson of Theatre for a New Audience’s Council of Scholars (and a Consulting Scholar on the production) spoke via Zoom with director Arin Arbus and actor John Douglas Thompson.
AYANNA THOMPSON What was the genesis of this production? I know you two have worked together several times over the years. When did this first percolate up to the surface? And what were your initial thoughts about it?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON It started with—we did Othello together, what was that? 2008?
ARIN ARBUS 2008 and ’09, yeah.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON And there was a point in time, maybe four or five years ago, I was interested in doing it again. Or doing a production of Othello with some similar cast, just taking another shot at it. And that wasn’t able to happen. And then, we—partially me and partially Jeffrey [Horowitz] and partially Arin—we came up with this idea, “Well, what about Merchant of Venice? What about Shylock?” And it was something that I’d been interested in playing because I had played it before, but like 25 years ago. And there’s a similarity in character, to me, between Othello and Shylock in the nature of their otherness.
AYANNA THOMPSON And Arin, what attracted you to that proposition?
ARIN ARBUS I think it’s a really good role for John. I was really excited by the idea, just in terms of embodying the person who says the words that are in this play. I could immediately imagine John being great. I also didn’t know what it would mean to have a Black man in that role. And that was exciting to me. So, I was immediately really intrigued by the idea.
AYANNA THOMPSON And what do you think the production brings to this moment in 2022? Why do you think this is an important play for us to return to now?
ARIN ARBUS I find this to be one of Shakespeare’s ugliest plays. I think it’s a world filled with hate and intolerance. And I think the play’s an indictment of capitalism and the cages that capitalism puts individuals in and the hierarchies. And unfortunately, it feels very close to the world that we live in.
And we are setting the production in—every time I try and say it, I giggle a little bit, I’m a little bit embarrassed—but we’re setting the production in the near future. Just because there are such specific circumstances in the play that are a little different from our world. And yet, I can imagine a world in which, in America, there is a literal ghetto with a wall that Jews are forced to live in, in a couple of years.
And it seemed exciting and important to have the company reflect the world that we live in. So, it’s a racially diverse cast.
AYANNA THOMPSON John, what is it like to play a Black Jewish character, in the near future, in which there is a walled ghetto?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Afrofuturism. (laughter) No –
AYANNA THOMPSON Afropessimism. (laughter)
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON What was exciting to me was, obviously, we live in a world where there is a Jewish struggle that, to me, is similar to the Black struggle. There is anti-Blackness and there is also anti-Semitism. So, having me be that figure, kind of representing both—because there’s a lot of intersectionality, I think, between those two struggles—was kind of exciting.
Shylock is, in my mind, a proxy for the other, if you will. Whether that other is Black, whether that other is immigrant, whether that other is based upon gender, whether that other is based upon sex, whether that other is based upon religion, culture... Shylock, for me, represents all those others. And I feel that we do live in this world where large groups of people, different people, are being persecuted for their differences. And this allows me on some activist level, to speak to that as an actor. Just some little actor
Yonatan Gebeyehu (Solanio), John Douglas Thompson (Shylock) and Alfredo Narciso (Antonio). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
trying to speak to some of the bigger issues of the world. Shakespeare, for me, does that. So, to be a participant, being Shylock as a Black Jew, enables me to bring that message.
The idea of having a very diverse cast that looks like the communities that we live in was also important. Because oftentimes, when you do these kinds of plays, you just don’t see that, right? It’s often binary, right? It’s Black and white or maybe just all white, which is sometimes even more challenging because then it’s making a larger statement that other people aren’t really necessary, or wanted, or valued in this world. So, this level of diversity, and having it look like the world that we live in, gives value and credence to all these other types of people.
So, that’s what makes it feel right for me. It’s not as if I wanted to say, “This has got to be done from a Black Jew’s sole perspective.” That is the touchstone, but there’s much more to address. And if I can address it specifically, then the play can speak universally, if that makes any sense. AYANNA THOMPSON Isn’t that what August Wilson said? That the way to universality is through specificity.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON And singular specificity, this level of religious persecution that is forced by the Christians against the Jews. That level of specificity, or that lens, allows a wider scope to be addressed, I think.
AYANNA THOMPSON And I think it’s fantastic that you are now entering into a line that’s not very long of Black actors who’ve played Shylock—but maybe this will be a tipping point? We have Ira Aldridge, who famously incorporated performances of Merchant of Venice into his touring shows in Eastern Europe. And we have Paul Butler in Peter Sellars’ [1994 production at the Goodman] and maybe a handful of others. But you will be the first on a major New York stage. So, does that mean something to you as well? Or is that something that you don’t think about?
Left: Ira Aldridge as Shylock. Photo by I. Asanova (?). St. Petersburg, Russia, 1858. Image courtesy of Chesapeake Theatre Company's digital exhibition "Ira Aldrige: Theatrical Trailblazer." Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Original image in the Aldridge Collection, McCormick Library of Special Collections, Northwestern University, MS 4. Above: John Douglas Thompson (Shylock). Photo by Henry Grossman.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON I don’t think about it a lot. I do think about it some. And it’s meaningful. It’s really about passing the torch. Because I know some other actors, like the great late Johnny Lee Davenport, who was kind of a mentor to me, who did [the role] many, many years ago. I met him at Shakespeare & Company and he talked to me about that role and that performance and what that meant to him.
But it is my hope that by doing this we will see a female Shylock, we’ll see an Asian Shylock, a Latinx Shylock. Because the role is there for everyone. And thinking of Judaism as purely white, when there are so many non-white Jews… hopefully my performance can be the beginning of that opening and we can start to look at this role in a diverse nature, as it should be looked at, certainly in the 21st century. AYANNA THOMPSON Arin, I wonder, now that the production is up on its feet, what have you learned through hearing the dialogue being spoken?
ARIN ARBUS God, I don’t know yet, to be honest with you. I’m feeling very affected by Act Five and the ending of the play, which is—even today in staging it, I’m shocked by it, it just is horrendous. And the last line, which is a vagina joke, I can’t even believe that it’s there.
I knew that that’s what it was, and I knew it was this weird, uncomfortable joke. But then, we staged it and I actually don’t know what to do. I was so kind of offended by it, that I thought, “Maybe I have to tell Haynes [Thigpen], who’s playing Gratiano, maybe I’ve gotta tell him not to be so awful.” But he’s doing the text! I’m not being very articulate because I haven’t wrapped my brain around the experience of the play yet.
AYANNA THOMPSON I do think in the 21st century, it’s hard to have a production that ends comedically. Because the play does shut so many people out, it does reinforce a bizarre superstructure that we may be thinking about deconstructing in our world now. Maybe showing that mirror of horror up in the production will open up dialogues for the audience about potential changes that we’d want to make in the world we live in.
ARIN ARBUS That would be amazing. I think that’s what Shakespeare’s intention was.
AYANNA THOMPSON John, has anything surprised you in the language, now that you are in the staging phase?
John Douglas Thompson (Shylock). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON I guess the same thing that always surprises, or that I become aware of, in this stage of a production, is the potency of the language. It feels real. And the way that people express themselves, albeit in a nasty way sometimes. But what sticks out to me is the contradictions of the characters: they say one thing and they do another, or they profess that they are one thing, but they actually are the opposite of that. So, what really
strikes me is the humanity that I think is in the language, because I think people are that way.
I remember having discussions with Arin, that this is not a play that is happening in outer space, or with another species. This is us, which is ugly. And then there’s also beautiful aspects of the play, which is also us. So, as I get to this stage of the game, and I give all credit to Shakespeare. Wow, how well he understood people. Their intentions, their motivations. So, what surprises me is how real it can become with a group of people when they’re working on it. The language has potency, it really has urgency, and complications, and cost.
AYANNA THOMPSON I think this play has potentially more direct language than some other of Shakespeare plays. Maybe it’s related to what you were just saying, that people say one thing and do the exact opposite. And so, in fact, you need what they’re saying to be pretty clear for the divide between the spoken word and the action to resonate with the audience. It doesn’t have any of that weird circumambient language of Macbeth or even King Lear, where it’s knotty, knotty, and hard to say. That’s not what this play does, right?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON No. Every character is extremely contradictory which, as an actor, becomes really interesting to play. Because oftentimes, as an actor, it’s like, “Oh, I need to even this out. If I say this in this scene, I need to be that, or follow through with that.” Whereas people, normal people, everyday people, say one thing and mean another, can be mean to someone, and then kind to the next person they meet... and that’s just who we are.
Shirine Babb (Nerissa), Varín Ayala (Jailer), Sanjit De Silva (Bassanio), Alfredo Narciso (Antonio). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
So, as I was watching the play today, I was like, “Oh, these are just people.” These are just people living their life as they think it should be and going through their life with a certain amount of intention; whether it hurts another person or not is not their concern. It’s really about how can I move forward in my life?
AYANNA THOMPSON I think that’s absolutely right. I also think the casual racism and antiSemitism that is spoken in the play is very real in our life now. You hear snatches of conversation on street corners and you’re like, “I can’t believe they’re actually saying that.” And you know that they’re not horrible, evil people.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Yeah. There was a story—did you see it on CNN, Arin? I think it happened in Brooklyn, where this woman spat on this 8-year-old Jewish child. And then said a bunch of racial epithets to this kid. That just happened like two days ago. And we talk about that in the play, which is 400 years old. So, there’s a sameness to the world that we live in that is also the world that we’re playing out in Merchant of Venice. AYANNA THOMPSON And the people who know that woman who spat on the child probably think that she’s nice and normal in the rest of her life.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON She probably has a child herself, that she loves to death and is gonna go home and cook dinner, and then dress him up for school, and go to school... you know, all those things that good people do. But they’re also capable of very, very bad things.
And it’s not just one person. As I watched the play, I was like, “Oh, we’re all guilty of the same stuff.”
AYANNA THOMPSON Arin, I was wondering if you could talk about some of the women in the play and how you’re staging them in this production?
ARIN ARBUS The women are really alone in this world. I’m not thinking of Portia and Nerissa as besties, which is a legit way to stage it. But we are emphasizing the fact that Nerissa is employed by Portia. And in this production, Portia is a Latinx woman, Nerissa’s a Black woman. So, Portia’s racism against the Prince of Morocco is particularly
Shirine Babb (Nerissa) and Isabel Arraiza (Portia). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
pointed, or I hope heard or felt, because of Nerissa’s identity and reaction.
Yesterday, we were looking at the scene where Portia gives the keys to Lorenzo and Jessica. And I was sort of pushing Isabel [Ariza], who’s playing Portia, to be disrespectful to Jessica. Because I think Portia is anti-Semitic and I think Jessica’s experience in Belmont is terrible. And Isa was like, “I think that’s not necessary. I just want to be nice to her. She’s another woman and she’s here, I just want to…” And it’s just not—that’s not the play. In addition to dealing with anti-Semitism and racism and xenophobia, I think the play is also dealing with misogyny and patriarchy. And they all find themselves trapped within these systems or issues.
AYANNA THOMPSON And unable to imagine other systems.
ARIN ARBUS Yeah, and at times enforcing the same old systems.
AYANNA THOMPSON Oh, absolutely. Even when they feel as if they’re transgressing through crossdressing, et cetera, it’s just to shore up the same system. It’s a remarkable play for the characters’ lack of creativity. I think about other Shakespeare comedies where the young people are running off to the woods and having a good time. Think about A Midsummer Night’s Dream, they’re breaking the rules, imagining swapping lovers. Merchant is a whole bunch of people who cannot think their way into a new world, right?
ARIN ARBUS That’s so beautifully put.
AYANNA THOMPSON For me, one of the most heartbreaking lines, John, is when Shylock talks about the turquoise ring from Leah, his wife, and the fact that his daughter has traded it for a monkey.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON A monkey, yeah. I think it gives a new level of understanding of Shylock to those that are listening, if it’s heard. Of the kind of man he was. It gives credence to this back story that he was happily married. He loved his wife and he still remembers the days when he was courting her, so to speak, his bachelor days when he met her, and this wonderful exchange that
Danaya Esperanza (Jessica) and Nate Miller (Lancelet Gobbo). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
was given from one to another. And the fact that it wasn’t valued enough by his daughter to say, “Okay, no, not that ring. That ring is really important for my mom who’s no longer here and definitely for my father. We cannot sell that. Sell everything else, but not the ring.”
So, it also makes me feel like, “Oh, she was in such a mood that she didn’t know what she was doing.” I get the feeling—I have to as a father—[that] she was led by some other people. I know my daughter wouldn’t do this on her own. So, it expresses who Shylock was back then and who he is now. And the fact that he still loves his daughter: “How could she have done this, how could she have hurt me in that way? She must not have known.”
So, yeah, I think about it as a really interesting thing to say for Shylock and his [marriage], but it also hints to my connection to my daughter.
AYANNA THOMPSON And of course, it sets up this odd parallel, where we have Portia, who’s apparently abiding by the will of her father, and Jessica, who’s breaking the will of her father, right?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Because I don’t know why she does what she does, running off with a Christian and becoming a Christian—I still almost can’t believe that. I almost feel she was forced into that. There’s a part of me that is mad at her for this, but another part [believes] that she was led astray by the people that have been persecuting us forever. And of course, under that level of pressure, yes, she did something really wrong. But if I could get her back, if I could get her back… and maybe she wants to come back. So, that’s the backstory in my mind. It’s not about her leaving me, it’s about her almost making her way back to me, so I have to find her. I have to find her.
It is an amazing line for the fact that it does give people this insight into, maybe, the romantic Shylock. Because I do feel like he’s really alone. He’s so alone. Without anyone to reach out to, particularly after his daughter is gone.
John Douglas Thompson (Shylock). Photo by Henry Grossman.
AYANNA THOMPSON His isolation is so palpable, and the fact that he is a widower. And as you say, we get that one glimpse into the past life. You realize, what was that play? What was the play when Shylock and Leah…?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Their courting, their romance. I do feel it was a happy relationship. I want to believe that it was. And it’s gone.
AYANNA THOMPSON Arin, can you tell us about the set design and costumes? What does your near future world look like?
ARIN ARBUS The set designer is Riccardo Hernandez, whom I’ve worked with on many shows. And we started looking at images of just Venice, actually. And steps in Venice is what we sort of kept coming back to. And then, we were actually also looking at red carpet events, strangely, like the James Bond movie premiere, which seems totally insane. But the architecture—I sort of saw it in passing, and the architecture was so similar to the steps in Venice, with this huge red carpet.
And there was something about the fact that it’s these sort of fabulous people in the play, these very wealthy, very glamorous people who are behaving in such ugly ways, that felt interesting to me. And then Riccardo was looking at the architecture from the Third Reich, and it actually looks like a James Bond movie premiere, strangely. And the play is so much about hierarchies, so that also felt sort of connected.
And then, we have a wall. The material is concrete, which is what you use to make a wall to divide certain people from other people. But it’s also chic. Rich people have concrete floors in their kitchens. And it’s eternal, it’s ancient, and in 1,000 years, if there are still people around, they will be probably making things out of concrete.
And the costumes are very much of now, they feel very much of the contemporary moment—there’s no space suits or anything like that. (laughter) And Emily Rebholz is designing the costumes and she has an amazing eye for clothes, as opposed to costumes. And that’s what I hope it will feel like. AYANNA THOMPSON I love that distinction between clothes and costumes.
ARIN ARBUS Yeah, because this is not about kings and queens, or gods, or heroes. It’s about us. It’s about the people in the audience.
AYANNA THOMPSON The aural landscape: what does it sound like? Do you have music?
ARIN ARBUS There actually is not very much music in this play. I think we will have music. We’re still developing that. I think we’ll really hear it in tech for the first time. But I don’t think I’ve ever directed a Shakespeare play with less music than this one.
AYANNA THOMPSON It’s back to that language: the language is so spot on that you don’t even have to amplify the mood with music or anything, right?
Isabel Arraiza (Portia).Photo by Henry Grossman.
ARIN ARBUS Right. He usually gives you a release, something joyous, or a break from what’s going on through music. And in this play, there is not.
AYANNA THOMPSON Speaking of lack of a break, what do you both imagine is Act Six of Merchant of Venice? We’ve talked about the missing love story for Shylock, the birth of Jessica, the happy times. Where are we in Act Six, after this production?
ARIN ARBUS Well, I think you have a different play for every person because I don’t think they’re in the same place together. (laughter)
AYANNA THOMPSON Ah, yeah. So, some people are in a comedy, some people are in a tragedy, some are in a history....
ARIN ARBUS Everyone kind of ends up alone. Even the couples, they’re isolated from each other. There’s nobody who is…. In my fantasy world, the sixth act is a reunion between Shylock and Jessica. That’s my fantasy. AYANNA THOMPSON And John, what about for you? Have you thought about where Shylock would be in Act Six?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON I just purchased this book, it’s an old book, it’s about Shylock after the end of the play. I haven’t read it yet, but the synopsis was, after Shylock is forced through baptism to become Christian, what his life entails moving down that road.
I can see an Act Six where Shylock expires. He gives up. Particularly if Jessica is never coming back. What is there to really live for? I could see that, where Shylock just checks out. It’s awfully depressing, of course, because you want to think that you just keep going. But I think the events that have happened in Shylock’s life, in these two weeks or whatever, are enough for him to just say, “I’m done.”
Or he goes back to the Rialto and making deals again.
AYANNA THOMPSON I was going to say, Venice doesn’t work without him as a money lender.
Danaya Esperanza (Jessica) and David Lee Huynh (Lorenzo). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Right. But it’s different now: how is he being treated by the Christians, and then how is being treated by the Jews? Where is he living? Did he get to move out of the ghetto? Is he moving in a different place? Did he leave Venice and just go somewhere else? I don’t know. I feel like, certainly, after the courtroom, how do you come back from that? You know what I mean? What is your comeback when they got you like that?
You know the law will never work in your favor. Even though I’ve become Christian, they can probably say, “You’re still an alien, so you don’t have the rights of other Christians.” So what has that left?
Or I can see an Act Six where he just keeps looking for Jessica, he will not give up the search looking for his daughter. Because he knows when he finds her, he can talk her back home or talk them back into a relationship.
AYANNA THOMPSON Wow. Pretty profound. So, what do you hope people will bring to the production? And what do you hope they’ll take away from the production?
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Oh, that’s a director’s question.
ARIN ARBUS I hope that people will come to experience the play, interpreted by this company, with an open heart. That’s what I think you always want. I hope that they recognize the limits of the world as it is.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON A weird part of me wants them to come in with their prejudices and biases and—
ARIN ARBUS They will, John. We don’t have to worry about that. (laughter)
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON And if that’s the case, then [I hope] they are severely challenged. And that a debate can happen. If not with each other, individually: a dialogue with themselves because they saw something that challenged their
John Douglas Thompson (Shylock). Photo by Gerry Goodstein.
preconceptions. And maybe, in the best of all possible worlds, a commitment to do better, to be better, to be open, to be more accepting, to be more tolerant, those kinds of things.
And I think that’s all that an actor has. Sometimes, I look at what I do and say, it’s so frivolous, it’s like making candy, or making a doll. What purpose is this going to have to another human being? But listen, I became an actor because I saw something that moved me profoundly, [August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone at Yale Rep in 1986]. So, I know this work can change people because it changed me.
That’s why I do it. I always feel like whenever I’m performing, there’s one person that needs something that I have to give, and I have to meet them. If I’m not prepared to fully give within the nature of the work that I’m doing, I’m going to miss them. We’re not going to meet. And they leave without something they needed, and I leave knowing I didn’t give something that I should’ve.
Because when I sat and I watched that August Wilson play, they were doing something for me. It was as if they were performing for me. And maybe I needed something. I guess I did. And they gave it to me. They gave it to me. So, I think theater, whatever it is we do, can be a gift to others. It really can, I believe in the power of it. So, I hope this will affect people and shift them.
AYANNA THOMPSON I think that’s where we can end, because I think that’s why you’re considered one of the greatest working actors in theater today. It’s the commitment that you bring to your craft, and it’s there every night you’re on stage.
John Douglas Thompson (Shylock). Photo by Henry Grossman.
JOHN DOUGLAS THOMPSON Thank you.
AYANNA THOMPSON Thank you so much for your time, it’s really a pleasure talking to you about this challenging piece of art. And I can’t wait to hear the debates at TFANA.•
AYANNA THOMPSON is a Regents Professor of English at Arizona State University, and the Director of the Arizona Center for Medieval & Renaissance Studies (ACMRS). She is the author of Blackface (Bloomsbury, 2021), Shakespeare in the Theatre: Peter Sellars (Arden Bloomsbury, 2018), Teaching Shakespeare with Purpose: A StudentCentred Approach, co-authored with Laura Turchi (Arden Bloomsbury, 2016), Passing Strange: Shakespeare, Race, and Contemporary America (Oxford University Press, 2011), and Performing Race and Torture on the Early Modern Stage (Routledge, 2008). She wrote the new introduction for the revised Arden3 Othello (Arden, 2016), and is the editor of The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race (Cambridge University Press, 2021), Weyward Macbeth: Intersections of Race and Performance (Palgrave, 2010), and Colorblind Shakespeare: New Perspectives on Race and Performance (Routledge, 2006). She is currently collaborating with Curtis Perry on the Arden4 edition of Titus Andronicus. In 2020 Thompson became a Shakespeare Scholar in Residence at The Public Theater in New York. In 2021, she joined the boards of the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Folger Shakespeare Library, the National Parks Arts Foundation, and Play On Shakespeare. Previously, she served as the President of the Shakespeare Association of America, one of Phi Beta Kappa’s Visiting Scholars, a member of the Board of Directors for the Association of Marshall Scholars, and a member of the Woolly Mammoth Theatre board.
