God of Carnage

Play Background
➢ God of Carnage is a play by Yasmina Reza, a French playwright, actress,
novelist, and screenwriter
➢ The play originally premiered in 2008
➢ Reza generally writes satiric plays that reflect contemporary middle class
issues
➢ God of Carnage can specifically be categorized as a satirical dark comedy
 The Circumstances
➢ Setting:
- Location of the play is vague, takes place in a living room
- Year is presumed to be around the time the play was written (2008)
➢ The Characters:
- Annette & Alan Raleigh
- Veronica & Michael Novak
➢ Plot:
- Two sets of parents meet after their children have a physical dispute on the
playground at school. But as they try to discuss the issues, the parents become
increasingly childish and the evening dissolves into chaos.
- One of the most intense scenes is a scene in which one of the characters
projectile vomits on stage
 Productions
➢ God of Carnage has been produced on several occasions world wide, though
it is not an extremely well known play.
➢ The play was first presented in London in 2008 but moved to America in 2009
➢ One of the more popular productions took place at the Ahmanson Theater in
2011
- “Reza hopes to offend. Why else would her stage directions call for a ‘brutal
and catastrophic spray’ of vomit?... Even if Reza's moral is mechanically
delivered, there's something theatrically bracing about the sight of grown-ups
throwing off their civilized constraints.”
➢ Fun Fact: Impulse Theatre Company here at USC also did a production of God
of Carnage last semester!
 Design Ideas
➢ Costumes:
- Costumes are very much based in character
- For example, Alan is a serious lawyer so you’d have him in a suit, but Michael is
a more goofy father character so you might have him in something like a
sweater vest
➢ Set:
- The set design is pretty flexible and can be simple or complex, as long as you
can tell it is a living room it gets the point across
➢ Mechanical Design:
- There are several possible ways of designing the mechanics for the vomit
scene
- When I was involved with the production last semester, we used a special sack
for the vomit and held it in a purse
Questions?
 Sources
● https://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2011/04/theater-review-god-of
-carnage-at-the-ahmanson-theatre.html
● https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/god-of-carnage-482510
● https://www.thoughtco.com/god-of-carnage-overview-2713426
● https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_of_Carnage
● https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasmina_Reza
● https://images.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl