Review: God of Carnage, Lace Market Theatre, by Alan Geary

Two healthy-sounding boys have had a routine playground bust-up, during the course of which one has damaged the other's teeth. Doing the civilised thing, the parents of the offender turn up at the home of

the victim to discuss the matter with his parents and work out what's to be done.

Originally written in French, Yazmina Reza's God of Carnage has been a tremendous hit in many translations and many countries. It was filmed a couple of years back as Carnage. This Lace Market production, the second of the season, offers a clear demonstration that this success is justified: it's a superbly crafted play.

But, aside from displaying the merits of Reza as a dramatist, director Graeme Jennings and his team have put together something excellent in itself. The four performances are accomplished or more, and the set deserves to win prizes.

Hugh Jenkins and Sarah Taylor are Michael and Veronica Hunt, the parents of the victim; Fraser Wanless and Emma Nash play their opposite numbers, Alan and Annette Raleigh. All four are well differentiated.

Wanless's man is high-powered City lawyer and crass and unsocial with it. He's on his mobile for half the time; when he isn't he's only semi-engaged with the action. It's a strong performance. In contrast, Jenkins's man is low-powered, modest and conciliatory.

Taylor's finest moments come when Veronica gets hysterical and starts drinking rum straight out of the bottle and when she beats her husband about the head with a cushion. Nash has three of the highs of the evening: one when she does a highly realistic and porridgey chunder all over the set, another when she deliberately drops Alan's mobile in a vase of water, and yet another when she vandalises two real bunches of flowers.

Emma Pegg has come up with an amazing cool set, all primary colours; and oddly elongated so that the pokey Lace Market stage looks positively spacious. Since this is newly-gentrified Brixton, there's a window at the back through which can be seen a suitable London skyline. It's deliberately too extreme to be realistic.

Reza seems to be saying that just beneath the surface of your average law-abiding liberal lurks a raging amoral savage. The four adults in this piece are, in this respect, no different from their sons. It might be Ayckbourn taken to a logical conclusion – and it's surely The Lord of the Flies all over again.

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Review: God of Carnage at The Lace Market Theatre. Nottingham

Director Graeme Jennings has made a terrific job of bringing to life this one act play by Yasmina Reza (English translation from the original French by Christopher Hampton) at Nottingham's premier amateur theatre - The Lace Market Theatre.

God of Carnage is about the breakdown of two supposedly sophisticated and successful couples after they meet to politely discuss the potential solution of their young sons fighting and the resultant missing teeth of the young son of the Hunts - in whose modern and stylish house we meet the protagonists and remain in their company for the duration of the play.

The set design is of a very modern apartment based on a black and white hop scotch pattern and it serves the play perfectly with the designer, Emma Pegg, creatively following through on Reza's staging notes of a living room, no realism, nothing superfluous. With some colour highlights this is a monochromatic world that according to the excellent programme notes "alludes to the barely concealed conflict between the characters." Deliberately, only the two artfully arranged vases of flowers and the red carpet and cushions bring any bright colour to the set.

Easy going Michael Hunt (Hugh Jenkins) tries to reason things out with Alan and Annette Raleigh and attempts to form a friendship with Alan through recognition that all boys fight and that it is part of the growing up process. Alan Raleigh superficially goes along with this man talk but is constantly at the beck and call of his mobile phone. Fraser Wanless plays the arrogant Alan to perfection. This is no one dimensional character portrayal however. Wanless subtly switches his role from mood to mood whether he is speaking his business demands down the mobile phone or temporarily comforting his wife Annette (Emma Nash) after she has been dramatically sick on stage. He controls and commands the stage with Alan's persona and is the master of wry humour.

This is a demanding four hander and the performances are very professional especially from the actresses Sarah Taylor and Emma Nash playing the wives. The women go through a vast array of emotion throughout the play and Taylor and Nash bring out very truthful performances through their body language and barely controlled emotions that go from socially polite to sudden outrage and lack of control.

Hugh Jenkins plays the most sympathetic character in Michael Hunt, a man who just wants to keep the peace yet finds himself getting out of control with a toxic mix of problems including his mother constantly calling up for health advice and his weird decision to set the family hamster free to fend for itself in the wild. He valiantly tries to cope with all this, alongside the trauma caused by his son being attacked and injured by another boy. Jenkins plays the sympathy card well with this well rounded character, always at the ready with the hair drier to fix every disaster.

On the surface the play could be perceived as a serious polemic on the breakdown of social morals caused through lack of compassion, uncivil and  selfish behaviour, stress and exacerbated by too much rum and it does have this in the background but the evening's entertainment was that of laughter as the characters descended into ridiculous childish behaviour. There are some fantastically funny situations and lines and the actors worked them to perfection. This is another 'must see' at the Lace Market Theatre.

The performances run until the 19th October.

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Adrian Bhagat went to see God of Carnage at the Lace Market Theatre

Yasmina Reza's play, originally in French but translated here into English and to London, is a black comedy of manners. After a fight between their 11-year-old sons, two sets of middle class parents meet to discuss the situation in an adult and co-operative manner. Gradually tempers fray, angry words are expressed and the scene descends into chaos as the God Of Carnage takes control.

Initially the characters exchange false smiles and there is an undercurrent of class competitiveness as the two couples size each other up in a power play.Veronica and Michael (played by Sarah Taylor and Hugh Jenkins), whose son is the injured party, at first have the moral high ground. Alan and Annette (Emma Nash and Fraser Wanless) are on the back foot as thier parenting is under examination, not least because Alan's attention is constantly diverted by telephone calls in which he lies about the safety of a pharmaceutical company's product.

Amongst the moralising and expressions of parental responsibility, these middle class pretensions are soon discarded, quickly followed by the facade of happy family life until immorality is exposed and the thin veneer of civilisation is entirely shrugged off. Loyalties are dropped and new alliances made - as the couples argue, the women unite against the men, the men assert their caveman instincts until everyone unites against Alan and his constantly buzzing mobile phone. It's interesting that the observations on social class in Reza's excellent script translate so well across the Channel, suggesting Republican French society is not so very different from class-obsessed Britain.

You may have seen Roman Polanski's excellent film adaptation, Carnage, starring Jodie Foster and Kate Winslet. If so, you will be prepared for the moment at which Annette chunders copiously across the coffee table, an effect which is rendered very convincingly in this production.

The amateur cast of four fill their demanding roles very well and director Graeme Jennings keeps the tempo up bringing the play to a close in 90 minutes, without an interval. Despite the brevity, it's quite exhausting to watch and also a joy, funny and dramatic at every turn.

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