God of Carnage a play by Yasmina Reza is being performed through April 17th at the Goodman in Chicago. The Goodman production is directed by Rick Snyder and stars David Pasquesi (Alan), Keth Lacke (Annette), Mary Beth Fisher (Veronica), and Keith Kupferer (Michael). Originally Le Dieu du Carnage was first was performed Germany in 2006. It was first produced in English in London in 2008, using a translation by Christopher Hampton. The original London cast featured Ralph Fiennes as Alain, Tamsin Greig as Annette, Janet McTeer as Véronique and Ken Stott as Michel. In 2009, God of Carnage won the 2009 Tony Awards for Best Play, Best Direction, and Best Actress.

The American version of the play takes place in an apartment in Brooklyn. Like her play Art, the Goodman set is all in white with a minimum of props. It may be interesting to note the other productions have set the apartment in red, perhaps create a visual bookend between the two plays. The play begins when two pairs of parents meet because one parents’ boy has hit the other parents’ boy in the face with a stick, and the victim’s parents wish to discuss the occurrence in a polite, civilized manner. Alan is an international lawyer with a cell phone in his face. Annette is Alan’s, uptight, second wife, who is balancing being a mother with work on Wall Street. Veronica, whose child has lost two teeth, is a liberal stay at home mother and aspiring writer and Michael her husband owns a local hardware and is a suppressed Neanderthal who hates the fact that his neighborhood is being taken over by liberals, lawyers, and stock brokers.

As the play unfolds, the parents are there at Veronica’s urging to discuss in a civilized manner the fight between their two eleven year old boys. In first minutes, the parents politely debate whether the child who hit the other boy with a stick should be described as being “armed.” Initially, the two couple are aligned together, taking sides to defend their boys. Quickly, as nerves explode and rum flows, the polite social barriers break down and the parents become, in the words of the playbill, “ultimately, far crueler than their children.” In the end, the men take sides with one another against the women, as the women regroup, but finally they are all on their own.

According to reviews, Yasmina Reza has said, “I would like to see [audiences] laugh at the right moments.” In the Goodman production, the laughs come after the broader slap stick moments instead of after the sharp witty dialog as intended. Under Snyder’s direction, the play is a highly entertaining 75 minute farce ending in a brief moment of promised carnage but when compared to other productions, this production is described by critics as not all the God of Carnage can be. Yasmina Reza contends that she writes tragedies that are funny rather than writing comedies that are tragic. In this case, it may be a tragedy that this funny play does not have a sharper ending.

For Lynette and me, the important question driving home after any play always is who did it on Broadway, and who will appear in the movie? According to Wikipedia, Roman Polanski is currently directing the film adaption. The film will star Jodie Foster (possibly miscast) and John C. Reilly playing Veronica and Michael, while Christoph Waltz and Kate Winslet will play Alan and Annette.

On Broadway, three different casts played the roles, starting with James Gandolfini (Michael), Marcia Gay Harden (Best Actress as Veronica), Jeff Daniels (Alan), and Hope Davis (Annette). Following the original case, Ken Stott, Christine Lahti, Jimmy Smits, and Annie Potts performed the roles, and finally, Jeff Daniels reversed roles playing with, Janet McTeer, Dylan Baker, and Lucy Liu. We have seen Jeff Daniels in several plays and enjoyed his performances in other comedies, but Christoph Waltz seems perfectly cast as Alan for the movie. Finally, in thinking about the Goodman production, it is too bad that Tracy Letts was just coming off of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, because, as good as David Pasquesi is as Alan and as hard as Keith Kupferer tries to bring Michael to life, Letts would have been an excellent Alan and might have brought new dimensions to Michael.