Christopher John Francis Boone (15-year old maths-genius detective); Ed Boone (Father); Judy Boone (Mother); Siobhan (School mentor); Roger & Eileen Shears (Neighbours); Mrs Alexander (Neighbour); Rhodri (Father's employer); Toby (Christopher's pet rat); Wellington (Mrs Shears' dead dog)
Susannah Clapp, of The Observer, wrote in 2013, "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time was one of the most original shows and startling successes at the National last year. It's hard to recall the surprise of this... Yet it at first seemed unlikely that Mark Haddon's novel about a boy with a mathematical gift and 'behavioural problems' could possibly work in the theatre."[2]
Mark Haddon said with some awe, when he beheld the play's success, "We may have a Warhorse on our hands."[3]
Characters
Christopher John Francis Boone: The 15-year-old protagonist, who investigates the murder of Mrs. Shears' large black poodle
Ed Boone: Christopher's father, a boiler engineer. Prior to the beginning of the story, he has been living with Christopher as a single parent for two years
Judy Boone: Christopher's mother. Early in the book, Christopher writes that she died of a heart attack two years before the book's events
Siobhan: Christopher's para-professional and mentor at school. She teaches him how society works and how to behave within its complex guidelines
Mr Roger Shears: One of the neighbours who lived near the Boones, but has left his wife before the story begins
Mrs Eileen Shears: Mr Shears's wife, who attempts to console Ed for a time after Christopher learns of his mother's death
Mrs Alexander: An old lady, who is one of Christopher's neighbours, who offers information to help Christopher's investigation regarding his parents and Mr and Mrs Shears
Rhodri: Ed Boone's employee
Toby: Christopher's pet rat
Wellington: Mrs. Shears' large black poodle, which Christopher finds dead in her garden, with a garden fork sticking out of him.
Plot
The play is about a 15-year-old amateur detective named Christopher John Francis Boone who appears to have Asperger syndrome,[4] although the affliction is never explicitly stated in the play.[5] The titular curious incident is the mystery surrounding the death of a neighbour's dog.[5]
While searching for the murderer of the dog, he encounters resistance from many neighbors, but mostly from his father, Ed Boone. Christopher argues to himself that many rules are made yet still broken, so he continues to search for an answer; he compares himself with Sherlock Holmes. When he discovers that his father killed the dog, Christopher fears for his own life and travels to London to find and live with his mother, whom his father had told him has died. He encounters many problems during the journey, but is welcomed by his mother. However, the road to his ambitions leads him back to Swindon, where he wants to pass important math tests. Everything seems to be an obstacle, but Christopher eventually reunites with his father and his future looks good.
Production
Adapted by Simon Stephens and directed by Marianne Elliott,[6] it premièred at the Royal National Theatre's Cottesloe Theatre on 2 August 2012.[1] It starred Luke Treadaway as Christopher, Nicola Walker as his mother Judy, Paul Ritter as his father Ed, Una Stubbs as Mrs. Alexander and Niamh Cusack as Siobhan.[7] The production, which ran until late October 2012, was broadcast live to cinemas worldwide on Thursday 6 September 2012 through the National Theatre Live programme.[8] The show transferred to the West End Apollo Theatre in March, where it is now booking until 25 October 2014, and is expected to continue as an open-ended run for the foreseeable future.[9]
Awards and nominations
The nominations for the 2013 Laurence Olivier Awards, which recognise excellence in professional productions staged in London, were announced on 26 March 2013. The production secured the most nominations with eight, including Best New Play, Best Director (Elliott), Best Actor (Treadaway),[10] Best Actress in a Supporting Role, and other categories including Best Set Design, Best Lighting Design, Best Sound Design and Best Choreographer.[11] The production eventually won seven Olivier awards,[12] thereby equalling Matilda the Musical's record win total in 2012.[13][14]
Other pending award nominations include Critics' Circle Theatre Award, which were most recently awarded in January 2013,[15]Evening Standard Award, which were most recently awarded in November 2012,[16] and Theatrepeople.com Awards, which were most recently announced in November 2012.[17]
Matt Wolf of The New York Times noted that the play's debut was well-timed in relation to the 2012 London Summer Olympics: "its triumphalist spirit tallies exactly with the mood of this summer's athletic aspirations".[5]
Ben Brantley, the chief theater critic of The New York Times, wrote, "As directed by Marianne Elliott, working with an inspired set of designers, Christopher's maiden voyage into an alien metropolis becomes a virtuoso study in sensory overload. Those lights, noises, street signs, road maps, random words that spell themselves into being, and, oh yes, that moving staircase that materializes out of nowhere: it all keeps coming at you..." Brantley goes on to say that the "extraordinary accomplishment" of the play "is that it forces you to look at the world through Christopher's order-seeking eyes. In doing so you're likely to reconsider the dauntless battle your own mind is always waging against the onslaught of stimuli that is life. Scary, isn't it? Exhilarating too."
However, Brantley found fault with "having Siobhan (Niamh Cusack), Christopher's special education teacher, recite the story he has written, presented as a school project. Ms. Cusack does this with a gushy, artificial sense of wonder that you associate with grown-ups talking to small children... Yuck."[18]
Charles Spencer of The Daily Telegraph explains Siobhan's role further: "The dramatic conceit is that Christopher's warm-hearted teacher at his special needs school, reads the book he writes about his attempts to solve the mystery of a dog that was brutally killed in a neighbour's garden, and decides to stage it as a play. That may sound cumbersome but it works superbly..."
Like others, Spencer praises Treadaway: "What makes the production even more special is Luke Treadaway's astonishing performance as the 15-year old Christopher. He is unbearably poignant in moments of distress when he kneels with his face on the ground and moans, but also movingly captures the character's courage, his brilliance at mathematics, and his startling perspectives on the world... thanks to Treadaway's pained honesty and twitchy awkwardness, as well as his moments of exultant joy, Christopher Boone feels like both a hero and a friend, though the happy ending is rightly qualified." Spencer also praised Gleason: "There are a host of excellent and often comic supporting performances, with especially fine work from Sean Gleason as the anguished father who loves his son but hurts him terribly, and Niamh Cusack as the kindly teacher."[19]
Simon Stephens' clever adaptation of Mark Haddon's bestselling novel about a teenage boy with Asperger's syndrome is like a cute dog that leaps up and wants to lick you all over. There's no point in resisting – and there's no need... The beauty of the evening is magnified by Bunny Christie's witty design, in which infinite possibilities and multiplying confusions are represented in squares and numbers... There are times when the show comes perilously close to sentimentality, but the clarity of Christopher's gaze is so unflinching that it often makes you uncomfortable, and the show is equally clear-eyed on the difficulties of parenting, messiness of life, and torment of a child who cannot bear to be touched. The novel gets you inside Christopher's head, but the stage version does more, giving Christopher's internal response to the world an external manifestation. That world is often a surreal and scary place, but oddly beautiful and bizarre, too... Leading a fine cast, Luke Treadaway is superb as Christopher, appealing and painful to watch, like the show itself.[20]
Simon Stephens's imaginative adaptation and Marianne Elliott's brilliant production...manage to throw fresh and arresting light on the material while keeping a perfect equipoise between the comedy and the heartache. And I do not see how Luke Treadaway's phenomenal performance could be bettered. He seems to inhabit, with every twitchy atom of his being, this isolated boy whose detective work about a dead dog digs up less categorizable secrets about his parents' marriage and the wider community... He talks in a slightly accusatory and officious blurt as if he knows that his meaning will have to barge through several layers of prejudice to be heard. Even his agitatedly methodical movements are as a mass of straight lines, like his thoughts, as when he perceives with uncluttered immediacy that the word 'metaphor' is itself a metaphor. To hear Treadaway deliver perceptions like [this] with an air of narked, impatient genius is to be reminded that Wittgenstein and Beckett are amongst those who have operated on this spectrum.[3]
This appealing and ingenious adaptation of Mark Haddon's cult novel is lit up by Luke Treadaway's vivid central performance... he is superb from first to last, mixing pedantic defiance with a gut-churning vulnerability... Simon Stephens has done an expert job of translating Haddon's writing into absorbing theatre... The complexities and peculiarities of his worldview are expressed through Bunny Christie's magical design." Hitchings notes "the strange algebra of Christopher's thought processes... Confronting the chaos of daily life, he is troubled by sounds, metaphors and unfriendly colours. These can cause him to shut down. But he finds solace in puzzles and in the company of animals (chiefly his pet rat Toby). The choreography by Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett of Frantic Assembly enhances our sense of Christopher's erratic journey through the muddle of relationships. There's strong work from Seán Gleeson as Christopher's father, Holly Aird as his mother and Nick Sidi in half a dozen roles... Treadaway is thrillingly good: I don't think there's a better performance right now on the London stage."[21]
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