The Tony and Olivier Award-winning dark comedy God of Carnage will be presented on stage in a new production starring Doctor Who star Freema Agyeman.
The actress recently starred opposite Lily Allen in the TV comedy Dreamland. She is best known for her role as Doctor Who's companion Martha Jones.
In September, she will perform as Veronique Vallon in a revival of Yasmina Reza's play at the Lyric Hammersmith.
Agyeman expressed to BBC News her "beyond delight" at returning to the stage.
After one 11-year-old knocks out his classmate's two front teeth in a playground brawl, two sets of parents cross paths in the story of God of Carnage.
The boys' parents get together for a supposedly calm and civil discussion about their child's altercation. However, the parents' own tantrums, name-calling, and tears cause chaos.
"God of Carnage made me gasp and chuckle in equal measure," Agyeman said of his decision to stay in the dark comedy subgenre after Dreamland.
Along with the amazing cast, I'm looking forward to this play and am thrilled to be working with director Nicholai La Barrie, whose enthusiasm is contagious.
Christopher Hampton, who took home the Oscar for best adapted screenplay for The Father in 2021, translated Reza's play for an English-speaking audience.
Before moving to Broadway the following year, God of Carnage had its West End debut in 2008.
In addition to winning the Tony and Olivier Awards for best comedy, the play also won additional Tony Awards for best play and best actress for Marcia Gay Harden.
In addition to the most recent installment of the Matrix series, Resurrections, Agyeman's screen credits also include Torchwood, Silent Witness, Law and Order, The Carrie Diaries, and others.
From September 1 to September 30, she will appear in the Hammersmith production of God of Carnage alongside Ariyon Bakare, Dinita Gohil, and Martin Hutson.
The Lyric, according to Agyman, has an "incredible history and tradition" and consistently produces "high-calibre work.".
God of Carnage makes fun of wealth, power, and money, according to director Nicholai La Barrie. It lifts the veil on civility, which is hilarious to witness. I immediately thought of this play as being a reflection of the cosmopolitan cities in which we currently reside. ".
Arifa Akbar of the Guardian wrote in her review of the play's 2018 revival in Bath that the play's 2009 run in the West End "put in just enough laughs, balanced with middle-class menace and marital rage, for the play to earn its reputation as a savage comedy that tears away the veneer of respectability in modern bourgeois lives to expose the bigotry, anger, and predations that lie beneath.".
Prior to writing God of Carnage, Reza established her reputation with the 1994 play Art, which also won numerous Olivier and Tony Awards.
