News

Let the wild rumpus of the well-off parents start: Mirvish Productions is planning to bring Broadway hit God of Carnage to Toronto, The Globe and Mail has learned.

Producer David Mirvish's team has been “putting out feelers” to actors about starring in an all-Canadian production of French playwright Yasmina Reza's scathing comedy in 2011, according to a source.

God of Carnage , a brutal farce about two sets of upper-middle-class parents who meet to discuss a fight their children had in a park, won the Tony Award for best play this year.

The critically acclaimed New York production stars James Gandolfini ( The Sopranos ) and Marcia Gay Harden (Oscar winner for Pollock ) as one pair of self-absorbed parents, and Jeff Daniels and Hope Davis as the other.

All four actors were nominated for Tony Awards – and Ms. Harden won for best actress in a play. (In mid-November, this quartet will pass the baton to a new cast headlined by Jimmy Smits from NYPD Blue .) Mr. Mirvish is an investor in the Broadway production of God of Carnage, and also invested in the 2008 London production that starred Ralph Fiennes.

The director of both – Tony winner Matthew Warchus – has worked with Mirvish Productions in the past. He directed the ill-fated Lord of the Rings musical that began life in Toronto in 2006.

Mr. Mirvish also produced the Canadian premiere of Ms. Reza's first big hit, Art , in 1999 in co-production with Winnipeg's Manitoba Theatre Centre. The Toronto theatre company is in talks with MTC about once again co-producing on God of Carnage. Originally set in Paris, the action of Ms. Reza's play was moved to the Cobble Hill neighbourhood of Brooklyn for its U.S. premiere in Christopher Hampton's translation and adaptation.

Whether the Toronto production will take place in Paris, New York or Forest Hill, we don't yet know. On the subject of God of Carnage , Mirvish Productions would only say: “No comment.”