Desdemona Hagen appeared in the role opposite Robeson in Margaret Webster's production at the Shubert Theatre in New York City in 1943. In cinema, Suzanne Cloutier played Desdemona opposite Orson Welles in a version that won the Palme D'Or at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival. In a 1966 film which holds the record for the most Academy Award nominations given to a Shakespeare film, Maggie Smith played the character opposite Laurence Olivier. Smith and co-stars Olivier, Frank Finlay (Iago), and Joyce Redman (Emilia) all received acting nominations. Irène Jacob played the character in a 1995 film opposite Laurence Fishburne. There have
Othello Othello suffocates Desdemona, but in Cinthio, the "Moor" commissions the "Ensign" to bludgeon his wife to death with a sand-filled stocking. Cinthio describes each gruesome blow, and, when the lady is dead, the "Ensign" and the "Moor" place her lifeless body upon her bed, smash her skull, and cause the cracked ceiling above the bed to collapse upon her, giving the impression its falling rafters caused her death. In Cinthio, the two murderers escape detection. The "Moor" then misses Desdemona greatly, and comes to loathe the sight of the "Ensign". He demotes him, and refuses to have him in his