Lahti, Potts, Smits and Stott to Bicker as Broadway's New GOD OF CARNAGE Leads 11/17- Page 2

[yeomansden]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:04pm

<----showing my age here as well. Potts was my favorite of a group of amazing actors in Designing Women.

[Mildred Plotka]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:05pm

My favorite Potts role. I prefer her in comedy.

What self respecting young gay boy hasn't seen Designing Women!

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:19pm

Lahti did some amazing work recently on Law and Order: SVU. The show really doesn't have a reputation for terrible acting. And I loved Annie Potts in Men in Trees.

[heo1128]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:25pm

These are quite strange choices...I'm thinking they were hoping that the previous success it's already gained will keep people coming, because these names certainly won't. As others have said I'm sure they were interested in keeping the actors' paycheck low.

Also, don't know if I qualify as the 'younger' folks you all are referring to, but I'm 21 and am familiar with Smits, Lahti, and Potts.

[WithoutATrace]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:33pm

If the show had opened with this replacement cast, the show would have flopped bigtime. I agree that it will close by February.

[frogs_fan85]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:43pm

Aren't Lahti and Pott going to read a little too old to be the parents of young boys?

[yeomansden]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:50pm

Hair and makeup can do wonders...yes, they do seem to be going a little older with the cast though, which does seem odd.

And I asked the question about Jeff Daniels earlier, but for that matter, going through their imdb profiles, I don't see Marcia Gay Harden or Hope Davis being that huge of a draw either. Maybe once someone went in to see Gandolfini they said, "Oh, yeah, I remember him/her." But from what I see of their recent work, I just can't see anyone saying, "Hope Davis? I loved her Six Degrees! I've got to see that." (though I actually did love her in that.)

[americanboy99]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:52pm

BLAH.

[Drunk Chita Rivera]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:53pm

"Drunk Chita doesn't know the plot of Star Wars so I doubt they know who Smits is. "


So you're back? You seem to have something against me and can't get over the fact that I am 14 and more mature than you.

These are not very big names, even for people older than myself. I doubt my parents know who any of these people are.

If you ask any kid my age they won't know who they are, they don't even know who the 4 cast members now are, I least I knew who they were.

[Mildred Plotka]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 4:58pm

You aren't God of Carnage's target audience.

I'm sure your parents know who Smits and Lahti are. They've been on major television shows and around for a very long time.

And even if people don't know Potts by name they'd recognize her by voice and face.

You're not the standard for the "average opinion" hon. And the only thing I have against you is your wide generalizations as fact.

"I'd don't know them so nobody else would".

Lahti has been on Broadway more times than the average actor. And Smits was in a major tv show, is currently on a tv show, and was in one of the biggest film trilogy's of all time. The average target audience for Carnage knows who he is.

[yeomansden]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:02pm

"Lahti will be great but I'm not seeing it with the rest. Smits and Potts both bore me. Potts is a little long in the tooth don't you think?"

Oh, having just checked the ages on imdb, Potts is two years younger than Lahti...but I do have to wonder on all the ages...Smits is the youngest (of the three US actors), and he's 54...

[Sauja]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:03pm

Maybe I'm the only one, but I think this cast could be pretty great. Maybe their names won't drive folks to the box office right away, but if these folks are as good in the roles as I think they might be, re-reviews will be incredibly strong, and those will push people to go out and catch it.

Lahti has given incredible performances on stage and screen that are well-remembered by many people, if not the people on this board. Tons of people love Designing Women and therefore Annie Potts (again, most of them not here). The idea of bringing an original member of the London cast over is a thrill. And Jimmy Smits is incredibly charismatic and pretty famous. I like to think the producers cast this for relative fame and actual talent rather than just throwing some hack with a name on stage (I'm looking at you, Katie Holmes). I say Bravo.

[Mildred Plotka]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:05pm

Davis is 45 and easily looks 5 to 10 years older.

Harden is 40 and looks it.

Gandolfini is 48

[James2]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:06pm

Some of us in the late teens/early 20s know Annie Potts as Bo Peep in the Toy Story movies. At least, I do.

[Pgenre]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:19pm

Not that awards give automatic credence to someone, but Marcia Gay Harden won a Best Actress Oscar for POLLOCK (and I can think of a few other performances of hers - most recently, in King's THE MIST as a nightmare version (!) of Margaret White from CARRIE - that also deserved the award as much if not more) so that, and that alone, should be enough to consider her a "name".

And she was in the OBC of ANGELS IN AMERICA...

Plus, she's just divine.

And EVERYONE knows who Jeff Daniels is, whether from THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO or whatever, and Gandolfini IS Tony Soprano, probably the most memorable television character since Archie Bunker.

This new cast PALES in comparison... I like Potts, Lahti and Smits but they ain't in the same league. Calling them B-list is being kind to anyone but Smits.

I'd like to see Swoozie Kurtz in this even if she is too old, she certainly reads no older on stage than those 2 ladies and she can command a stage like nobody's business from SCANDAL to HOUSE OF BLUE LEAVES.

P

[GimmeABreak2]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:33pm

Oh wow, Tamsin Greig was in the original (reading Stott's profile here...) I wish they brought her over. She's great.

[ACL2006]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:34pm

They'll sell tickets, maybe not at full capacity like the current cast, but this show could still make a profit for the rest of the year(Thanksgiving & Christmas are right around the corner). But I'll agree with everyone in saying the show won't be around by next spring.

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 5:59pm

DCR, I'm going to have to agree with Mildred Plotka that 1) you're not God of Carnage's target audience and 2) your parents would at least know who Jimmy Smits is.


And I feel really old now that everyone's commenting that these people aren't even well-known. And I'm not that old.

[logan0215]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:07pm

I love Annie Potts and am doing my part to start spreading Designing Women amongst my friends who now swap youtube clips of it on Facebook.

I may or may not be shopping around for outfits with shoulder pads and a big brown wig to be Julia Sugarbaker for Halloween...

[adamgreer]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:12pm

Smits is a fine actor, and he certainly has quite a following of middle-aged women who remember from NYPD Blue and the last two seasons of The West Wing (where he did his best work, IMO). He's not as well-known as Gandolfini (none of the replacements) are, but he's certainly not the no name that some people are making him out to be.

Lahti may be less well known, though I imagine most remember her face, seeing as how she's been on television pretty consistently for years now (however, I think she's been horrendous on SVU this year- completely over the top, but she's done great work in the past).

Gandolfini was clearly the main draw of the original foursome. Everyone at work I ever spoke with about this show wanted to see "the play Tony Soprano is in." As another poster mentioned, they may have recognized the faces of the other actors after seeing the show, but it was Gandolfini's name that got them in the door. Yes, Harden is an Oscar winner, but its not exactly as if her films are that well known. And sadly, despite some of his great work, most people know Jeff Daniels as Jim Carrey's Dumb and Dumber sidekick.

Inevitably, the grosses are going to fall, but I imagine the show will do all right with these actors, though it will be easier to get tickets, and I expect it to be at TKTS a lot more consistently.

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:19pm

Wow what a boring cast. I think I fell asleep halfway through reading the replacement list. Sorry but the play isn't that great, it needs a top notch cast to work AND to attract the audience. Who are some of these people? Smits is the only person that I think particularly fits Alan, and I'm sure Scott is great since he was in the original cast, but this play belongs to the women and sorry but Lahti and Potts? WTF?
There were dozens and dozens of wish lists that were far more interesting than this.
Yawn, yawn, yawn...asleep.

[Weez]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:23pm

Wow. You guys are all "age age age!", and I'm sitting here thinking "holy crap, the Atlantic makes a difference!". I've only just got to the Jimmy Smits episodes of West Wing, I only know who Annie Potts is because of Ghostbusters, and Lahti... pass. No clue.

But KEN STOTT, YOU GUYS! He's freakin' AMAZING. Listen to yankeefan! His Eddie Carbone is one of the stand-out performances I've seen in UK theatre this year (certainly the best lead actor I've seen in anything, although if you made me choose between him and Ronald Pickup, I'd be stuck), and as I'm currently rocking an "8 shows a month" average, that's a lot of performances to sift through.

After all these years, cultural divides still surprise me. The internet hasn't yet shrunk the world to the size of a pomegranate after all. :)

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:24pm

The first thing I think of when I hear Christine Lahti's name is how she was in the bathroom when they called her name for her Golden Globe win. It was all over the news at the time. She won the Golden Globe with her panties around her ankles. Good times.

[adamgreer]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 6:32pm

The first thing I think of when I hear Christine Lahti's name is how she was in the bathroom when they called her name for her Golden Globe win. It was all over the news at the time. She won the Golden Globe with her panties around her ankles. Good times.

Me too, and then I think of Robin Williams going up onstage, killing time, and pretending to BE Christine Lahti.

[Eris0303]

Posted: 10/15/09 at 7:31pm

I love Smits, Potts, and Lahti. They're great.

I remember when West Wing did the live debate between him and Alan Alda. I wanted to vote for him!
Smits appears at about 1:45