Cool jazz Othello

Charles Mingus, Dave Brubeck, John Dankworth and a dozen of their contemporaries play original music in this cool jazz Othello set during an after-hours jam session in London.

Paul Harris as Aurelius Rex (Othello) in Basil Dearden’s All Night Long (1962).

Othello in this story is Aurelius Rex (Paul Harris). Rex is a regal bandleader modelled after Duke Ellington (the musicians play their own music; Rex sits down to In a Sentimental Mood and Mood Indigo on a piano). Rodney ‘Rod’ Hamilton (Richard Attenborough as Roderigo), a wealthy jazz enthusiast, throws a surprise first wedding anniversary party for Rex and his wife Delia Lane (Marti Stevens as Desdemona) in his spacious warehouse loft.

Delia was a jazz singer, but she agreed to give up her career when she married the jealous Rex. American drummer Johnny Cousin (Patrick McGoohan as a tea-smoking Iago) wants to restart his stalled career by cutting a record with Delia on vocals. Johnny’s scheme implicates Cass Michaels (Keith Michell as a Cassio), Rex’s alto sax player, faithful friend and business manager; Rod’s party gives Johnny the excuse to invite booking agent Lou Berger (Bernard Braden) to hear Delia’s ‘comeback’ song. As Johnny tells Cass: ‘Maybe you want to blow sideman for the rest of your life while somebody else takes the bows and the loot. I’m 35 years old and I’m nowhere.’

This Othello retelling is unique in that nearly everyone at the party is a working jazz musician. In addition to the Philip Green’s original theme All Night Long, there are new numbers by Green, Mingus, Brubeck, Dankworth, Tubby Hayes, Kenny Napper and Johnny Scott.

Richard Attenborough hosts Charles Mingus in All Night Long (1962).

A jazz fan’s first treat comes when Rod rushes home to prepare for the party. Mingus is there by himself noodling on his bass with a pipe in one hand against the backdrop of a large wall-sized Abstract Expressionist canvas. Before long, Johnny Scott introduces Scott Free on flute in a set featuring Mingus, Tubby Hayes on vibes, Allan Ganley on drums and Colin Purbrook on piano.

There is fun too. Ganley’s drums find Pop Goes the Weasel as a poncy caterer marches out of the space at the head of four white-jacketed waiters—the last of which flips off the band with a flourish.

John Dankworth and band in Basil Dearden’s All Night Long (1962).

Dankworth and some of his boys show up. ‘Too bad Cleo couldn’t make it,’ Rod says, referring to Dankworth’s wife, the singer Cleo Laine. And then a young Brubeck wanders in by himself when the joint starts to jump. Although Brubeck and the musicians are not always natural actors, they are terrific performers and lose themselves in their music once they get going.  

Dave Brubeck and Allan Ganley, with Ted Scaife on camera in All Night Long (1962).

Brubeck’s first set is his original It’s a Raggy Waltz with Napper on bass; Bert Courtley kicks in on trumpet, Scott on alto sax and Ganley on drums. Cinematographer Ted Scaife is deft at finding ways to shoot musicians; he shoots this set as though he were a band member playing a camera.

 

Rex plays Ellington’s In a Sentimental Mood on piano with Keith Christie on trombone, and then he solos a cover of Harold Arlen’s The Devil and The Deep Blue Sea. He later dedicates Mood Indigo to his wife Delia, joined by Scott on alto sax, Ganley on drums and Ray Dempsey on guitar.

Patrick McGoohan as a tea-smoking Iago in All Night Long (1962).

An intense Johnny Cousins drum solo gins up the dramatic tension of the ongoing Othello story in which Delia’s cigarette case of ‘Persian gold with stones on it’, a present from Rex, sits in for Desdemona’s handkerchief.

Marti Stevens does an excellent job singing what is referred to as Delia’s standard All Night Long, as well as the ‘new’ piece I Never Knew I Could Love Anybody Like I’m Loving You (a big band piece by Ray Egan, Roy K. Marsh, Tom Pitts and Paul Whiteman) with Cass on alto sax and Barry Morgan on bongos. 

Marti Stevens’s Desdemona to Keith Michell’s Cassio in All Night Long (1962).

Mingus and Brubeck play a few bars of Mingus’s Peggy’s Blue Skylight before the denouement.

All Night Long is included in the four-DVD Criterion Eclipse collection Basil Dearden’s London Underground with Sapphire (1959), The League of Gentlemen (1960) and Victim (1961).

All Night Long 1962 U.K. (91 minutes) The Rank Organisation. Directed by Basil Dearden; screenplay by Nel King and Peter Achilles; cinematography by Edward Scaife; musical director Philip Green; editing by John D. Guthridge; produced and designed by Michael Relph.