Fragment of a poster for the "God of Carnage" Yasmina Reza play, dir. by Tomasz Man. Photo courtesy of Witold Gombrowicz Civic Theatre
Tomasz Man brings Yasmina Reza’s play back to the stage, with all its deliciously viscious dialogues and escalating tension
Gdynia’s Witold Gombrowicz Civic Theatre hosts the stage premiere of the black comedy, which recently premiered in the film version as "Carnage", directed by Roman Polański. Full of sharply intelligent, humourous dialogues woven by a masterful plot, the play provides a great scope of opportunity for virtuoso acting as it tells the story of two married couples meeting in order to discuss a playground fight their teenage sons got into. The ordinary meeting gradually turns into a hell.
"God of Carnage" has been a success ever since its 2006 premiere. It has been staged hundreds of times all over the world including the West End, Broadway and Theater am Schiffbauerdamm (the home stage of the Berliner Ensemble). The numerous prizes it has been awarded include The Tony Award for Best Play The Laurence Olivier Award for the Best New Comedy. In Poland it was most recently staged by Katarzyna Kalwat at the Teatr Powszechny in Łódź in January 2011 and by Marek Gierszał at the Juliusz Słowacki Theatre in Kraków in 2010.
Yasmina Reza, the distinguished French contemporary playwright, prose writer and screenwriter was born in 1959. She started her acting career while still a student of Sociology. Her first play "Conversations after a burial" premiered in 1987. It was highly successful and received numerous awards. In 1994 Reza wrote "Art". The play was translated into several dozen languages and brought its author worldwide fame. It was frequently staged in Poland. Some other plays the Polish audiences had the chance to see include "The Unexpected Man" (1990), "Life x 3" (2000) and "A Spanish Play" (2003).Reza is also the author of an adaptation of Franz Kafka’s "The Metamorphosis", directed by Roman Polański at the Théâtre du Gymnase of Paris.
Tomasz Man is an award-winning playwright and a director. He was born in 1968.
He has got a Ph.D. degree in Polish Literature which he studied at the Wrocław University and also is a graduate of the Warsaw Drama Academy’s Theatre Direction Faculty. In the years 2003-2005 he worked as a literary director of Rzeszów’s Wanda Siemaszkowa Theatre and was a repertoire advisor at the Adam Mickiewicz Theatre in Częstochowa in the years 2004-2005. He has written of theatre and radio plays, in addition to directing plays of his own and other contemporary playwrights such as Krzysztof Bizio, Michał Walczak, Marek Koterski as well as classical authors such as Shakespeare or Moliere at numerous Polish theatres including Białystok’s Aleksander Węgierko Dramatic Theatre, Poznań’s Polski Theatre, Warsaw’s Powszechny Theatre, Szczecin’s Współczesny Theatre, Toruń’s Wilam Horzyca Theatre and Gdynia’s Witold Gombrowicz Theatre.
Source: www.culture.pl , www.teatrgombrowicza.art.pl
"God of Carnage" by Yasmina Reza; translation: Barbara Grzegorzewska; stage direction, music compilation: Tomasz Man; stage direction: Anetta Piekarska-Man; the cast: Monika Babicka, Elżbieta Mrozińska, Bogdan Smagacki, Szymon Sędrowski.
Premiere: 14th of January, 2012, 7 PM. Repeats: 15th, 17th-21st of January 2012, 7 PM.
Witold Gombrowicz Civic Theatre of Gdynia
26 Bema St
81-381 Gdynia
Ph: (+48 58) 620 88 01, 620 88 37, 620 78 46
Fax: (+48 58) 661 71 23
website: www.teatrgombrowicza.art.pl