'Carnage' trailer

From Vivien Leigh taking on then unknown Jessica Tandy's Blanche Du Bois in A Streetcar Named Desire to Meryl Streep replacing Cherry Jones, who had originated the role of Sister Aloysius in the Broadway run of Doubt: A Parable, Hollywood has always played it safe in the stage-to-screen jump, choosing acclaimed screen actors over original stage performers.

None of the players of the original Broadway cast of French playwright Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage will appear in Roman Polanski's film adaptation of the play, simply titled Carnage, which will premiere at the Venice Film Festival, even though the cast included an Oscar winner (Marcia Gay Harden), an immensely popular television actor (James 'Tony Soprano' Gandolfini), a critically acclaimed indie actress (Hope Davis) and a household name and admired comic actor actor (Jeff Daniels). All four actors were nominated for Tony Awards for their performances, with Gay Harden taking home the prize as Best Leading Actress in a Play.

Instead, Polanski has chosen four arguably box office friendlier performers: the inevitable Kate Winslet (Hope Davis is simply a better, if less known, actress), Jodie Foster (who, at least to me, seems like an actress desperately at odds with the present decade), Christoph Waltz (who is yet to prove his splendid, Oscar-winning turn in Inglorious Basterds was no fluke) and John C. Reilly (maybe the choice I feel more comfortable with here).

Polanski is one of the great filmmakers of our time, and he confirmed it with his last film, the extraordinary The Ghost Writer, but my expectations for this film are strangely lukewarm. I hope my doubts will be dispelled when the film is released. In the meantime, here's the trailer.