Clowning causes confusion: Lenny Henry outside ‘Othello’

Lenny Henry’s foray onto the stage, playing Othello, is an ambitious move – one that it’s hard not to wish him well on. (And indeed, it seems to have gone quite decently.) But his clowning in interviews, slipping into the Dudley accent and recalling a childhood indifference to Shakespeare (‘it’s rubbish’), before throwing back his head and laughing like a stuttering horse, is jarring in the extreme. It becomes tough to take him seriously – instantly, you are back to the days of Lenny: Live And Unleashed and Theophilus P. Wildebeest.

The costume designers did him no favours, either – one of the outfits makes him look like Buttons from Cinderella, echoing the comic’s panto past. Perhaps he should become ‘Leonard P. Henry’, or revert to his birth name of Lenworth George Henry; or wear stylish glasses for interviews. He already has the moody photoshoots down pat.

On the other hand, why should he care about people’s perceptions of him? Well, it would certainly ease the brainache for a significant portion of Britain…