A Double Life

Shakespeare noir. George Cukor’s A Double Life not only centers on a performance of Othello but even incorporates themes from the Bard’s other works, such as Hamlet’s “resurrection” of a murder victim to reveal the killer’s guilt. Ronald Colman plays revered Broadway star Anthony John who’s performing Othello onstage opposite his ex-wife and best friend Brita (Signe Hasso) as the tragic Desdemona. From the start, it’s clear John comprises a kaleidoscope of personalities (acquaintances share wildly different views of him), but this latest role sends him over the edge: he descends so deeply into Othello’s character that he takes on the Moor’s murderous jealousy well beyond the stage. After terrifying Brita by strangling her too tight during a performance, he’s forced to hunt for a Desdemona understudy by walking the dark, abandoned Manhattan streets after the curtain call. Shelley Winters, the punching bag for film noir, plays a murder victim yet again, this time a loose, pushy waitress; for some reason, moviegoers always delighted in watching Winters bite the dust. The expressionistic lighting is stunning, as are the sets, particularly the contrast between the theatrical design onstage and the naturalism outside the theater, but what stands out most is the acting by the whole cast, especially Colman. Cukor had directed Ingrid Bergman to her first Oscar three years earlier in his other major noir, Gaslight (1944), and here he does it again with Colman winning the 1947 Best Actor prize. Also notable is the sound design, advanced for the mid-forties, which accompanies John’s breakdown with menacing inner thoughts and distant knocking besieging his mind at regular intervals. (Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan would recycle much of this plot sixty years later.)