They come from completely different worlds
to each other; in terms of race, in terms
of experience, in terms of age, in terms of
what it is that - I mean - I can't imagine
that these two women having much to talk about.
It's the first time she talks about her own
past.
I think that's the trick with this scene,
isn't it? Is that what you're both trying
to do is play 'light and life', rather than
that horrible impending sense of an end.
Emilia:
How goes it now? He looks gentler than he
did.
Desdemona:
He says he will return incontinent:
He hath commanded me to go to bed,
And bade me to dismiss you.
Emilia:
Dismiss me!
Desdemona:
It was his bidding: therefore, good Emilia,.
Give me my nightly wearing, and adieu:
We must not now displease him.
Emilia:
I would you had never seen him!
Desdemona:
So would not I -
Challenge her, with the - how dare you! So
would not I; and how dare you say - let's
take that challenge.
Emilia:
Dismiss me!
Desdemona:
It was his bidding: therefore, good Emilia,.
Give me my nightly wearing, and adieu:
We must not now displease him.
Emilia:
I would you had never seen him!
Desdemona:
So would not I my love doth so approve him,
That even his stubbornness, his cheques, his
frowns--
Prithee, unpin me,--have grace and favour
in them.
Emilia:
I have laid those sheets you bade me on the
bed.
Desdemona:
All's one. Good faith, how foolish are our
minds!
If I do die before thee prithee, shroud me
In one of those same sheets.
Emilia:
Come, come you talk.
Desdemona:
My mother had a maid call'd Barbara:
She was in love, and he she loved proved mad
And did forsake her: she had a song of 'willow;'
An old thing 'twas, but it express'd her fortune,
And she died singing it: that song to-night
Will not go from my mind;
You came into that scene with a Desdemona
that was irritated, impatient, sort of, wanted
to just kick something - like she exploited
that, exploited her status with her, and pushed
it as far as you possibly could. But in that
moment, when you threw the water at her, I
think what was lovely about the moment was,
that she could have responded very badly.
It's the feminist speech - 'this is what I
represent, this is what I do'.
Desdemona:
O, these men, these men!
Dost thou in conscience think,--tell me, Emilia,--
That there be women do abuse their husbands
In such gross kind?
Emilia:
There be some such, no question.
Desdemona:
Wouldst thou do such a deed for all the world?
Emilia:
Why, would not you?
Desdemona:
No, by this heavenly light!
Emilia:
Nor I neither by this heavenly light;
I might do't as well i' the dark.
Desdemona:
Wouldst thou do such a deed for all the world?
Emilia:
The world's a huge thing: it is a great price.
For a small vice.
Desdemona:
In troth, I think thou wouldst not.
Emilia:
In troth, I think I should; and undo't when
I had
done. Marry, I would not do such a thing for
a
joint-ring, nor for measures of lawn, nor
for
gowns, petticoats, nor caps, nor any petty
exhibition; but for all the whole world, God’s
pity--why, who would
not make her husband a cuckold to make him
a
monarch? I should venture purgatory for't.
Desdemona:
Beshrew me, if I would do such a wrong
For the whole world.
Emilia:
Why the wrong is but a wrong i' the world:
and
having the world for your labour, tis a wrong
in your
own world, and you might quickly make it right.
Desdemona:
I do not think there is any such woman.
Emilia:
Yes, a dozen; and as many to the vantage as
would
store the world they played for.
But I do think it is their husbands' faults
If wives do fall:
Now actually, why don't you try and get in?
Particularly, you know, don't try and hide
from her.
Emilia:
Who would
not make her husband a cuckold to make him
a
monarch? I should venture purgatory for't.
Desdemona:
Beshrew me, if I would do such a wrong
For the whole world.
Emilia:
Why the wrong is but a wrong i' the world:
and
having the world for your labour, tis a wrong
in your
own world, and you might quickly make it right.
Desdemona:
I do not think there is any such woman.
Emilia:
Yes, a dozen; and as many to the vantage as
would
store the world they played for.
Emilia:
Where are they?
Desdemona:
But I do think it is their husbands' faults
If wives do fall:
What is it that they do
When they change us for others? Is it sport?
I think it is: and doth affection breed it?
I think it doth: is't frailty that thus errs?
It is so too: and have not we affections,
Desires for sport, and frailty, as men have?
She's right, she's absolutely right, you know,
men and women should be equal - I don't understand
you know, i do not think there is any such
woman - especially because we've modernised
it - we've said it now - how can the character
that I have played in the beginning say a
line like 'I don't believe that there are
women who have affairs', or 'they are ambitious
for their husbands and therefore have sex
with somebody else so that their husband could
advance'.
What's very important about what you just
did though, is that that conversation, well,
it was more of an argument, it was completely
improvised. It was literally - it acquired
a momentum and a muscle, because of what the
other person had said, because of the challenge,
and the prize of the idea that the other person
had expressed; and I think that's what we're
always trying to do with these scenes - so
they never seem inevitable.
