NY1 Theater Review: "God Of Carnage"
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Two new couples have taken over the roles in the Tony Award-winning play "God Of Carnage" at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theater. NY1's Roma Torre filed the following review."God of Carnage" has a very basic one-act premise that’s stretched to full length, and it’s to the credit of the author’s ability to construct engaging characters and the actor’s skills in fleshing them out that the play manages to seem more substantial than it really is. That’s why every one of the original Broadway cast members was nominated for a Tony. I’m happy to say the four replacements are, for the most part, equally praiseworthy.
The situation involves two couples in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn meeting to discuss a playground incident in which Allen and Annette’s young son attacked Veronica and Michael’s son, knocking out two of his teeth. Their civilized discourse quickly degenerates into the very same brutality that claimed their kids, the point being that beneath our sophisticated veneer, we’re all basically savages.
It’s a farce after all, and watching these outwardly mature adults tear into each other provides the same freakish thrill that we get from gawking at a car wreck.
In the Jeff Daniels and Hope Davis roles are Jimmy Smits and Annie Potts. He is a self-absorbed lawyer and she’s fed up with his addiction to work. They are both excellent.
The parts previously played by Marcia Gay Harden and James Gandolfini are now played by Christine Lahti and Ken Stott, who originated the role in London. They're fine actors but casting seems rather problematic. Lahti’s cultured elegance and classy wardrobe make it almost impossible to believe that she’d have anything in common with Michael’s limited working-class sensibilities, let alone marry him.
It never made much sense with the first cast either, but Harden, who won the Best Actress Tony Award, gave the impression that she’d re-invented herself into an overly-conscientious liberal. Lahti, by contrast, seems born into it and her hysterical outbursts don't quite convince us that she's capable of reverting into a brawling madwoman.
Criticisms aside, this 90-minute show is still, pound for pound, one of the most entertaining shows on Broadway. Given the combined firepower of the new cast, I suspect in time, they'll all be scoring knockouts as well.