God of Carnage on Broadway at the Bernard Jacobs Theatre: Cast and Creative

earned her first Oscar nomination in 1985's Swing Shift then won an Oscar 10 years later as a first-time director for her short film Lieberman in Love. In 1998, after multiple nominations, Lahti won both the Emmy and her second Golden Globe Award for her portrayal of Dr. Kathryn Austin on "Chicago Hope." Three years later her feature film directorial debut My First Mister opened the 2001 Sundance Film Festival. Lahti currently stars in four episodes of the new season of "Law & Order: SVU." Other projects have included Smart People, Yonkers Joe, and upcoming Obsessed. Lahti starred in the West Coast premiere of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Wendy Wasserstein's final play, Third, at the Geffen Playhouse. The play marked her third collaboration with the late playwright - the first being The Heidi Chronicles on Broadway in 1989 and "An American Daughter" for Lifetime in 2000. Film credits include Sidney Lumet's Running on Empty (1998 LA Film Critics Award, Golden Globe nomination), Leaving Normal, The Doctor, Bill Forsyth's Housekeeping, Whose Life is it Anyway? and ...and Justice for All. Television credits include "Jack & Bobby," (SAG, Golden Globe nominations), "Amerika," (Emmy and Golden Globe nominations), "Out of the Ashes," "The Pilot's Wife," "Open House," and "The Book of Ruth." Lahti starred in Three Hotels at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles. This presentation was a reprisal of her successful run in the play, which premiered at New York's Circle Rep Theater. She received a Drama Desk nomination for her role. Additional theatre credits include, Jules Feiffer's i, (Obie Award). Michael Weller's Loose Ends, Noel Coward's Present Laughter, John Guare's Landscape of the Body, Clifford Odet's The Country Girl, David Mamet's The Woods (Theater World Award), Ted Tally's Hooters and Steve Tisch's Division Street.
is making her Broadway debut in God of Carnage. She is well known for her role as Mary Jo Shively in the popular television series "Designing Women," as well as for her films Ghostbusters, Toy Story, Pretty in Pink and Texasville. Ms. Potts received two SAG Award nominations for Outstanding Female Actor in the Lifetime television series "Any Day Now," an Emmy nomination for "Love and War" and a Golden Globe nomination for Corvette Summer. Her other TV appearances include "Two and a Half Men," "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit," "Boston Legal," "Ugly Betty," "Men in Trees," "Joan of Arcadia" and "Huff." She appeared Off-Broadway in The Vagina Monologues.
Theatre credits include the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Anna in The Tropics by Nilo Cruz at the Royale Theatre in 2003; the New York Shakespeare Festival's Shakespeare in the Park production of Much Ado About Nothing in the summer of 2004, as well as Twelfth Night in the summer of '02. Also for the Public Theater, he has appeared in Hamlet, directed by Joseph Papp, and Michael Weller's The Ballad of Soapy Smith, directed by Robert Egan. Other off-Broadway appearances include Ariano, directed by George C. Wolfe; the American Place/Playwrights Horizon co-production of Buck, by Ronald Ribman; and for the Woman's Project at The American Place Theatre, he appeared opposite Linda Hunt in Little Victories. He appeared in many staged readings and workshop productions at New Dramatists, INTAR and The Puerto Rican Traveling Theatre. Regionally, he has been guest artist at The Colorado Shakespeare Festival's production of Othello. He appeared at the Hangar Theatre in Ithaca, New York, in productions of Loose Ends, The Rainmaker and Gemini; at the Center Stage, Baltimore, in Eric Overmyer's Native Speech; and in the West Coast premiere of Ariel Dorfman's Death and the Maiden, directed by Robert Egan at the Mark Taper Forum. Mr. Smits is a graduate of Brooklyn College's Center for the Performing Arts, CUNY and holds an MFA from Cornell University's Theatre Arts Program. Smits' can be seen in the upcoming independent films Mother and Child, opposite Annette Bening and directed by Rodrigo Garcia, and Backyard, directed by Carlos Carrera, which is Mexico's official Oscar submission for Foreign Film. His recent film work includes Robin Swicord's The Jane Austen Book Club, Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones and Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. His performance in My Family, Mi Familia earned him an IFP Spirit Award nomination. Other film credits include Price of Glory, Running Scared, The Believers, Old Gringo, Vital Signs, and Switch. Smits television credits include the four-part PBS documentary series Latin Music USA, which he narrates and an Emmy-nominated guest starring role in Season 3 of Showtime's "Dexter", preceded by his portrayal of Presidential candidate Matt Santos in "The West Wing". He received six consecutive Emmy nominations for his portrayal of Victor Sifuentes on "L.A. Law", winning the Emmy in 1990, and five Emmy nominations for his role as Bobby Simone on "NYPD Blue", for which he received a Golden Globe award, two additional nominations and four SAG Award nominations. Other television credits include the Showtime movies Solomon and Sheba and Marshall Law, the ABC miniseries Steven King's The Tommyknockers, the award-winning ABC movie The Broken Cord, Glitz, Dangerous Affection and The Cisco Kid for TNT.
is a four time Olivier-nominated actor. He originated the role of Michael in the London premiere of God of Carnage opposite Tamsin Greig, Janet McTeer and Ralph Fiennes. Ken starred with Albert Finney and Tom Courtenay in the original cast of the hugely successful Art by Yasmina Reza, adapted by Christopher Hampton and directed by Matthew Warchus. More recently, Ken has completed a successful West End run as Eddie Carbone in A View From A Bridge, as well as staring in many National Theatre of Great Britain productions such as The Magistrate, The Recruiting Officer, The Prince's Play and Arthur Miller's Broken Glass. Ken's other theatre credits include Henry IV Part 1 and 2 (RSC), Colquhoun and MacBryde (Royal Court), Heroes (Wyndham's) and The Faith Healer (Almeida). Film credits include Charlie Wilson's War, Girl In A Café, Casanova, The Mighty Celt and King Arthur. Television credits include "Hancock and Joan", "The Vice" (both of which Ken was BAFTA nominated for), "Rebus", "Messiah I to IV" and "Uncle Adolf".

YASMINA REZA (Playwright)
is a French playwright and novelist based in Paris whose works have all been multi-award winning, critical and popular international successes. Her play, Art, won Olivier, Tony, and New York Drama Critics Circle Awards for Best Play. The National Theatre production of Life (x) 3 received an Olivier Award nomination for Best Play. Other plays include Conversations After A Burial; The Passage of Winter, The Spanish Play, and The Unexpected Man. Those plays, as well as Art and Life (x) 3 have been translated into 35 languages and produced worldwide. Her last novel, Dawn Dusk or Night (Knopf 2008), has been translated worldwide.

CHRISTOPHER HAMPTON (Translator)
Christopher Hampton's plays and musicals have garnered two Tony Awards, an Olivier Award and the New York Theatre Critics Circle Award, while prizes for his film and television work include an Oscar, two BAFTAs and a Special Jury Prize at Cannes. Plays include The Talking Cure, White Chameleon, Tales From Hollywood, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Treats, Savages, The Philanthropist (to be revived on Broadway this season with Matthew Broderick) and Total Eclipse. He wrote the book and lyrics (with Don Black) for the musicals Sunset Boulevard and Dracula and the libretto for the Philip Glass operas Waiting For The Barbarians and Appomattox. He has translated extensively: Chekhov, Ibsen, Moliere, Odon von Horvath and Yasmina Reza (including Art [Olivier and Tony Awards for Best Play] and Lifex3). His screenplays include The Quiet American, Mary Reilly, Total Eclipse, Dangerous Liaisons, Carrington, The Secret Agent and Imagining Argentina, the last three of which he also directed. His most recently released film, Atonement, won Golden Globe and BAFTA Awards for Best Picture. Cheri, directed by Stephen Frears, premiered at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival.

MATTHEW WARCHUS (Director)
was recently represented on Broadway by Boeing, Boeing. His other Broadway credits are Yasmina Reza's Art and Life (x) 3; Follies, and True West. He has received three Tony Award and two Drama Desk Award nominations. Off-Broadway, he directed Ms. Reza's The Unexpected Man. His numerous West End credits include The Norman Conquests; Speed-the-Plow; God of Carnage; The Lord of the Rings; The Life of Stuff; Art; True West; The Unexpected Man; Our House; Tell Me on a Sunday, and Endgame. At the National Theatre he has directed Volpone, Life (x) 3, and Buried Child. At the RSC he has directed Henry V, The Devil is an Ass, Hamlet and The Winter's Tale. His operas, for Opera North, The Royal Opera and English National Opera, include Troilus and Cressida, The Rake's Progress, Falstaff and Cosi Fan Tutte.

MARK THOMPSON (Set and Costume Design)
has designed many productions for the National Theatre and Royal Shakespeare Company. On Broadway, he designed Bombay Dreams, Mamma Mia!, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Arcadia (Lincoln Center), Art, The Blue Room, Blast!, Follies (set only), The Unexpected Man, and Shadowlands. The Metropolitan Opera: The Queen of Spades and Macbeth. In London, Mark has worked many times in the West End and at the Almeida, Donmar and Royal Court. He designed the costumes for the film The Madness of King George and is the recipient of four Olivier Awards. Recent work includes: England People Very Nice and The Rose Tattoo (both at National Theatre), and Female of the Species with Eileen Atkins in the West End.

HUGH VANSTONE (Lighting Design)
has designed lighting for plays, musicals and operas in London, New York and around the world. He has received three Olivier Awards for his work in London, most recently for Pacific Overtures (Donmar). New York credits: Shrek, Boeing-Boeing (Longacre); Spamalot (for which his lighting was Tony nominated); Bombay Dreams (Broadway); Life (x) 3 (Circle in the Square); Uncle Vanya, Twelfth Night and Hamlet (BAM); The Graduate (Plymouth); Follies (Belasco); Blast! (Broadway); The Unexpected Man (Promenade); The Blue Room (Cort); Closer (Music Box); Art (Royale). Current work in New York: Mary Stuart (Broadhurst Theatre). In London: A Dolls House (Donmar Warehouse).

GARY YERSHON (Music)
Gary's theatre work encompasses scores for the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre, Royal Court, Almeida, Donmar Warehouse, Old Vic, Young Vic, the UK's major regional theatres and numerous West End shows. His contributions to Art, The Unexpected Man, Life (x) 3, Arabian Nights, The Play What I Wrote and RSC productions of Hamlet, Don Carlos and The Taming of the Shrew have been heard in NYC. Extensive work for BBC radio includes the Sony Award-winning "Autumn Journal." Television includes "Trial and Retribution," "Ebb and Flo," "James the Cat," "Painted Tales." His film work has been for Mike Leigh, as music director on Topsy-Turvy and composer for Happy-Go-Lucky. He also works as a writer, translator and teacher.

SIMON BAKER (Sound Design)
Simon graduated from the Guildhall School in 1992. He has served time in the sound departments of both the RSC and National. In 1999 he joined British sound design and rental company Autograph as part of the in house design team. Recent credits include Lord Of The Rings (Toronto and London - 2007 Olivier Nomination for Best Sound), Boeing Boeing (London and Broadway - 2007 Tony Nomination for Best Sound), I Am Shakespeare (Chichester) God of Carnage, Our House (UK Tour), Brief Encounter (Kneehigh Theatre), Norman Conquests (Old Vic) and Don John (Kneehigh Theatre) and Complicit (Old Vic).

CHRISTOPHER CRONIN (Sound Design)
Broadway designs include Will Ferrell's Your Welcome America, The Vertical Hour, Faith Healer, Bridge and Tunnel, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Life (x) 3, The Graduate (B'way and Tour), Jackie Mason's Prune Danish, and Much Ado About Everything. As Associate Designer: Boeing Boeing, Rock'n'Roll, Thurgood, Macbeth, Frost/Nixon, Butley, Festen, Primo, The Pillowman, A Streetcar Named Desire, Democracy, Jumpers, Retreat from Moscow, Frog and Toad, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Def Poetry Jam, Hollywood Arms, and Noises Off. Mr. Cronin holds an MFA from the Yale School of Drama, and thanks his family, Laura, Caitlin, and Tommy.

DANIEL SWEE (Casting)
is the Casting Director for Lincoln Center Theater, for which he has cast more than 50 productions including such award winning shows as The Coast of Utopia, Awake and Sing!, Henry IV, The Invention of Love, Contact, A Delicate Balance, The Heiress, Arcadia, Carousel, The Sisters Rosensweig. Additional Broadway credits include Frost/Nixon, Julius Caesar (starring Denzel Washington), The Retreat From Moscow, The Crucible (starring Liam Neeson), Art, Amy's View, The Heidi Chronicles. On Broadway this season: Joe Turner's Come and Gone (Lincoln Center Theater), Exit the King, Mary Stuart. He was a co-producer of the film The Great New Wonderful and Casting Director for the films The Hours, The Crucible, The Object of My Affection, Center Stage, Simpatico, Spinning Into Butter, Cold Souls. Member C.S.A.

DAVID TURNER (General Manager)
Since joining Stuart Thompson Productions in 2008 David has managed Boeing Boeing, The Seagull, and You're Welcome America on Broadway as well as the National Tour of A Bronx Tale. Previously, David managed numerous Broadway and Off Broadway shows including ...Spelling Bee, Show Boat, Barrymore, and the New York, Boston, and Chicago productions of I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change. From 1994 to 2007 he founded and ran the Adirondack Theatre Festival where he produced over 60 plays and musicals and lead the construction of a new theater in a vacant Woolworths store in Glens Falls, NY.

JILL CORDLE (Production Stage Manager)
Broadway: November, The Odd Couple, Glengarry Glen Ross, Reckless, The Tale of the Allergist's Wife, True West, Smokey Joe's Cafe, ART. National Tours: CATS, MOMIX, Catskills on Broadway, The Boys Choir of Harlem. Off-Broadway: Blackbird; Annie Warbucks; Rose's Dilemma; The Vagina Monologues; Blue Window; By the Sea, By the Sea...Stock: Park Your Car in Harvard Yard, Breaking Legs, Taming of the Shrew. Proud Equity member since 1988. Best credits: Emma Louise and Henry David.

KENNETH J. McGEE (Stage Manager)
Broadway: Monty Python's Spamalot, Disney's The Little Mermaid and Tarzan; Rent; Pacific Overtures; Jesus Christ Superstar; Seussical; On The Town; Bring In 'Da Noise, Bring In 'Da Funk. Off-Broadway: A New Brain, Glimmer, Glimmer and Shine; The Gorey Details, Surviving Grace; Over The River and Through The Woods. Thanks Jill!

BEATRICE TERRY (Associate Director)
Spring Awakening (Associate Director Broadway, National Tour). NY Directing: Accident and My Father's Funeral by Peter Maloney (Ensemble Studio Theatre), Double Infidelity and Measure for Measure (The Pearl), Lesbian Pulp-O-Rama! (HERE Arts Center, Swedish tour). Beatrice is a recipient of the NEA/TCG 2005-2007 Career Development Program for Directors.

DEBORAH HECHT (Vocal Coach)
Broadway: West Side Story, Hedda Gabler, The Seagull, Equus, Boeing Boeing, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, South Pacific, Little Mermaid, numerous others. Off-Broadway: MTC, NYTW, Public, Playwrights Horizons, Signature, others. Regional: Seattle Rep, Long Wharf, Hartford Stage, others. England: National, RSC. Film: Leaves of Grass (upcoming), Kinsey, others. Faculty NYU Grad Acting.

AURORA PRODUCTIONS (Production Manager)
Current projects: Blithe Spirit, Exit the King, Mary Stuart, The Philanthropist, The 39 Steps, Norman Conquests, Shrek the Musical, A Bronx Tale (Broadway & Tour), Frost/Nixon (Broadway & Tour). Other projects include Spamalot (Tour & International Companies) and over 150 Broadway shows and their tours. Aurora is Gene O'Donovan, Ben Heller, Bethany Weinstein, Melissa Mazdra, Amy Merlino Coey, Laura Archer and Dana Hesch.

ROBERT FOX (Producer)
New York productions include: Lettice and Lovage; Chess; Skylight; Amy's View; Vita and Virginia; The Judas Kiss; Closer; The Blue Room; Gypsy; The Boy From Oz; Salome; The Pillowman; The Vertical Hour; Frost/Nixon. London productions include: Another Country; Orphans; Chess; The Seagull; The Caretaker; Mad House In Goa; Burn This; Three Tall Women; The Breath Of Life; The Lady In The Van, Closer; The Harder They Come. His film producing credits include Another Country, A Month by the Lake, Iris, The Hours, Closer, Notes on a Scandal, Atonement.

DAVID PUGH & DAFYDD ROGERS (Producers)
first produced Art by Yazmina Reza, translated by Christopher Hampton, at the Wyndhams Theatre in London's West End. This has subsequently become the most successful play in London in the last 25 years as well as winning every major Award. Art opened on Broadway at the Royale Theatre, winning the Tony Award for Best Play. David & Dafydd then produced The Play What I Wrote by Hamish McColl & Sean Foley, directed by Kenneth Branagh at the Wyndhams Theatre, winning the Olivier Award for Best Comedy, and every review was a rave. It opened at the Lyceum Theatre on Broadway and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event. This was followed by Tom Stoppard's adaptation of Gerard Sibleyras' play Heroes at the Wyndhams Theatre in 2005, which won the Olivier Award for Best Comedy. David & Dafydd then produced one of the most successful productions ever in the West End, Equus, which starred Richard Griffiths and Daniel Radcliffe and played a sell-out season at The Gielgud Theatre. Their production of God of Carnage by Yazmina Reza, translated by Christopher Hampton, which starred Ralph Fiennes, Tamsin Grieg, Janet McTeer and Ken Stott has just played a phenomenally successful season at the Gielgud. They most recently produced Kneehigh Theatre's production of Noel Coward's Brief Encounter, which played for over 350 performances in the Cinema on the Haymarket and has just been nominated for four Olivier Awards. David & Dafydd are currently producing Calendar Girls by Tim Firth which will open at the Noel Coward Theatre in the West End on 4th April 2009.

STUART THOMPSON (Producer)
producer of this season's Exit the King starring Geoffrey Rush and Susan Sarandon; other credits include the Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize winning Proof; also Deuce, The Retreat From Moscow, The Play What I Wrote, The Tale of the Allergist's Wife, On Golden Pond, Not About Nightingales and The Chairs; Off-Broadway Red Light Winter and The Shape of Things. He has been general manager for 50 other Broadway productions, including this season's Shrek, You're Welcome America and The Seagull.

THE SHUBERT ORGANIZATION (Producer)
is responsible for the ownership and/or operation of 21 theatres in New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, DC and, under the leadership of Philip J. Smith, Chairman and Robert E. Wankel, President, continues its involvement in the presentation of distinguished theatrical productions. They include Cats, Sunday in the Park..., Dreamgirls, Little Shop of Horrors, The Heidi Chronicles, Jerome Robbins' Broadway, Lettice & Lovage, Dancin', Amadeus, The Gin Game, Passion and Indiscretions. The Shubert Organization's activities include the revitalization of the American theatre, participation in civic and community affairs, the introduction of phone and charge ticket sales and a computerized ticketing system. This wide range of operation has proven highly effective in New York and throughout the country.

SCOTT RUDIN (Producer)
Films include Doubt; Revolutionary Road; No Country for Old Men; There Will Be Blood; The Darjeeling Limited; The Queen; Margot at the Wedding; Notes on a Scandal; Venus; Closer; Team America: World Police; School of Rock; The Hours; Iris; The Royal Tenenbaums; Zoolander; Sleepy Hollow; Wonder Boys; Bringing Out the Dead; South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut; The Truman Show; In & Out; Ransom; Mother; The First Wives Club; Clueless; Nobody's Fool; The Firm; Searching for Bobby Fischer; Sister Act; The Addams Family. Theatre includes Passion; Seven Guitars; Skylight; The Chairs; The Blue Room; Closer; Amy's View; Copenhagen; The Designated Mourner; The Goat; Caroline, or Change; The Normal Heart; Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Doubt; Faith Healer; The History Boys; Shining City; Stuff Happens; The Vertical Hour; The Year of Magical Thinking.

JON B. PLATT (Producer)
Tony awards: Angels in America: Millennium Approaches (Pulitzer Prize for Drama), Perestroika, Copenhagen. Wicked: New York, San Francisco, London, Tokyo, Melbourne, Stuttgart. Tony nominations: Damn Yankees; Peter Pan; Hello, Dolly!; The Diary of Anne Frank; Lonesome West; Man of La Mancha; Wicked. National: The Sound of Music; Sunset Boulevard; Hair; Jesus Christ Superstar; Fiddler on the Roof; The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas; A Chorus Line; The Graduate; Blue Man Group "Tubes." Current: Wicked; Hair; Will Ferrell's You're Welcome America; Exit the King starring Oscar winners Geoffrey Rush and Susan Sarandon.

THE WEINSTEIN COMPANY (Producer)
Bob and Harvey Weinstein are co-chairmen of the Weinstein Company. They previously founded and ran Miramax Films which, during their tenure, was nominated for 249 Oscars and won 60. The Weinsteins have produced several award winning shows on Broadway and in the West End, including The Real Thing, Baz Luhrmann's La Bohème, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Producers, Frost/Nixon, Rock 'n' Roll, Young Frankenstein, August: Osage County, Boeing-Boeing, The Seagull, Billy Elliot, You're Welcome America: A Final Night With George W Bush, West Side Story, Hair and Exit the King.