Playwright

Yasmina REZA

Yasmina Reza, a French playwright and novelist, is best known for her play Art, which has been performed in more than 30 languages. Her play God of Carnage opened on Broadway in March 2009 to very favourable reviews.

Ms. Reza began her career as an actress. She is the daughter of Jewish parents; her mother was Hungarian, her father Iranian. She won a Molière award for her first play, Conversations After a Burial, in 1987.

She went on to translate Kafka’s Metamorphosis for Roman Polanski and to write another play, Winter Crossing, which premiered in 1990, but it wasn’t until 1994 with the premiere of Art in Paris that Ms. Reza received widespread recognition for her work. The 90-minute satire, in which three male friends feud over an all-white painting, earned the playwright international acclaim, as well as a Laurence Olivier Award and a Tony in 1998.

Of her plays, Ben Brantley wrote in the Times: "But if the world that Ms. Reza describes is filled with snarled ambiguities, her plays are as orderly as an obsessive-compulsive’s sock drawer. Originally written (and produced) in French, they are usually slender sitcoms, elegantly streaked with troubling shadows and shaped with Cartesian symmetry. They are plays that suggest reassuringly that human depths can, after all, be measured by a slide rule."

Her more recent plays include Life X 3 (2000) and A Spanish Play (2004). She is the author of three novels, including Desolation, Adam Haberberg, and Hammerklavier. Her book L’Aube le Soir ou la Nuit (Dawn Evening or Night) dealt with Nicolas Sarkozy’s pursuit of the French presidency.

God of Carnage won the Olivier Award in London as Best New Comedy in 2009 and three Tony Awards in Broadway in 2009.

Yasmina Reza wrote the script for Roman Polanski adaptation of the play into a movie. Carnage will open in theatres on December 16, 2011.

Source: This biography comes in part from an article from The New York Times, March 23, 2009.

Director

Diana LEBLANC

Artistic Director of TfT from 1991 to 1996, she directed, among others, the following plays: Eddie, Les Fantastiques, La Répétition, La Double inconstance, Soirée Jacques Brel, Les Femmes savantes, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, On ne badine pas avec l’amour, Fragment de mensonges inutiles, À toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou and Les Femmes savantes. At Théâtre français de Toronto, she has acted in La Maison suspendue; Damnée Manon; Sacrée Sandra; Le Pays dans la gorge; Le Chien, and La Voix humaine. Bilingual, she has acted at and directed for the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, National Arts Centre (NAC), Tarragon Theatre, Citadel Theatre, Neptune Theatre, Manitoba Theatre Centre, and Segal Theatre. For the Canadian Opera Company, she has directed Les Dialogues des Carmélites and The Rape of Lucretia. Founding member of Soulpepper Theatre Company à Toronto, she recently directed The Price by Arthur Miller. Ms. Leblanc was one of the first graduates of the National Theatre School in 1962 where she studied in both languages. She is a recipient of the Prix Alliance Française.

Véronique

Colombe DEMERS

Since graduating from the Conservatoire d’art dramatique de Montréal, Colombe has participated in numerous productions in Toronto and throughout Canada, including La Double Inconstance, Soirée Tchékhov, Les Femmes savantes, George Dandin (TfT); King Lear, Amadeus, The Little Foxes (Stratford); Lady Windermere’s Fan, You Can’t Take it With You (Shaw); Romeo and Juliet (CanStage); The Game of Love and Chance (Pleiades); Counter Service (Tarragon); A Flea In Her Ear (Soulpepper); Chekhov Longs (Theatre Smith-Gilmore); Hedda Gabler (Saidye-Bronfman); The Shape of Things (MTC/Citadel); Macbeth (Festival of Classics); Insomnia (Necessary Angel). With her company This is a Bird she wrote, directed, and acted in the production The Long Valley, based on the John Steinbeck short story collection (a Soulpepper co-production). It was nominated for three Dora Awards, one Stirling Award, and one Merritt Award. Selected films include Pointe-aux-Chimères, Appassionata, The Age of Dorian, Deadly Appearances, and the upcoming The Saint Judes (NFB). This winter she goes back on tour to Vancouver and Halifax with The Russian Play by Hannah Moscovitch.

Alain

Christian Laurin

Christian is thrilled to return to Théâtre français de Toronto to perform in God of Carnage. Originally from Montréal, Christian studied acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse (NYC). In 1992, Christian moved to Toronto to collaborate with Mump & Smoot for a Canada / US tour. Christian also worked with Theatre Smith-Gilmour on three productions: Le Malade Imaginaire, Dante’s Inferno at the Factory Theatre, and In the Wings of Eden. At the TFT he played in Fragments de Mensonges Inutiles, Les Précieuses Ridicules and Le Médecin Volant. His other theatre credits include: The Hollow, (Canadian Stage), Fallen Angels (Theatre Aquarius) and Carmen (COC) Christian has also appeared in numerous films and television productions, such as The Sopranos (HBO), The Pacifier (Disney), Hades Factor (CBS), The Pathfinder (Halmark Entertainment), Meteo+ TFO and Victor, produced by the CBC. Christian will also be seen in January 2012 in TFO’s brand new TV series Les Bleus de Ramville.

Michel

Olivier L’Écuyer

Olivier was in TfT’s production of Yasmina Reza’s Art twelve years ago. He is now delighted to take part in God of Carnage, his fifteenth production at TFT. TfT audiences have seen Olivier in Tartuffe, Le Faucon, Un Air de famille, La Critique de l’École des femmes, Le Mariage forcé by Molière, Portrait chinois d’une imposteure, and in the cast of L’Avare alongside Guy Mignault; this production received a Masque award in 2006. Two years ago, Olivier returned to the TfT for Michel Tremblay’s well-received Fragments de mensonges inutiles. Olivier was in the cast of Soirée Tchékhov and participated in the show’s triumphant Québec tour. He has been a hilarious Gars de Québec, followed by the English version, The Government Guy, at Tarragon Theatre. Olivier has appeared in various films and series shot in both Québec and Ontario, including the new series Les Bleus de Ramville, which will debut on TFO in 2012. He was part of the cast of the TFO series Francœur and he played businessman Sean Fraser in the tenth season of the popular series L’Auberge du chien noir at Radio-Canada.

Annette

Tara Nicodemo

Tara Nicodemo is a graduate of the Stella Adler Conservatory in New York. Some of her favourite stage experiences include The Shape of Things, Hellfire Pass, and Paradise By The River (Centaur Theatre); Dangerous Liaisons and The Diary of Anne Frank (Segal Centre); Cringeworthy (Theatre Passe Muraille); Beyond Mozambique (Factory Theatre); Hamlet, Tout Comme Elle/Just Like Her (Necessary Angel) and Hard Love (Teatron Theatre). She has also appeared in several television series and feature films, such as Mambo Italiano, Across the River to Motor City, Web of Lies, A Wake, Edwin Boyd, The Border, Against The Wall, and All Souls. A two-time Dora Mavor Moore Award nominee, Tara will be seen onstage this spring in Same Time Next Year at the Segal Centre in Montréal.

Set design & Lighting design

Glen Charles Landry

Glen Charles Landry has worked in theatre and television for over ten years. Glen Charles counts more than sixty productions that have been performed just about anywhere in the world. Recently, he made his directing debut with Croquis Urbains, a one-man show inspired by his published collection of poetry. For four straight years, he has been production designer for the National Aboriginal Achievement Awards, broadcast on Global and APTN. Last summer, Glen Charles was production designer for the opening and closing ceremonies of the World Athletic Games, broadcast on Radio-Canada and CBC. Most recently, he was production designer for the new Shawn Desman video, Electric/Night Like This. He was also set designer for the reality series The Big Idea 2, which will be broadcast on APTN this spring. He has designed the set for the February 2011 production of À toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou. Recently, he returned to the stage in The School for Wives, in the role of Enrique.

Stage Management

Gabriel DUBÉ

A native of Saint-Boniface, Manitoba, Gabriel got his first taste of theatre at Collège Saint-Boniface, followed by the Cercle Molière as an actor, stage manager, propsman, and assistant director. He was a radio producer at Radio-Canada’s CKSB Saint-Boniface from 1972-1978, then at CJBC from 1978-2006. For TfT’s 35^th anniversary, he recorded a compact disc comme morating the production La, la, la, mine de rien. At the beginning of the 1980s, he was a member of TfT’s board of directors. Today he works in the entertainment and communications fields as a director, consultant, and event coordinator. Gabriel stage managed TfT’s production Et si on chantait and On ne badine pas avec l’amour in 2008; Le Dîner de cons in 2009; Fragments de mensonges inutiles in 2010; Les Fridolinades in 2010, À toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou and L’École des femmes/em> in 2011.