Fall Play Review

On November 16th, last Saturday, I had the great opportunity to see "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime"by Simon Stephens at Cheshire Academy. It was directed by Mrs. Guarino, Mr, Hunton, as well as assistance from Mrs. Roller, and other members of the community. Some of the major actors in it were Amelia Williams, Pacifica Yang, Olivia Williamson, and William Lempling. The story is of a child battling autism as well as family issues. It is the journey of him growing up and learning more about the world and how it works. Many moments of this show are painful and emotional but there are moments of reward and joy too. In this production, he goes on both an internal and external journey. His external journey battles things like family issues, comprehending divorce, dealing with dog deaths, and even independent traveling. His internal journey battles the simple things like taking a train, taking care of pets, obeying adults while also having an independent opinion, and other things. Throughout the story you are given chances to sympathize with many characters but ultimately you are living Christophers story and learning about how he deals with such difficult issues. These are some reoccurring themes that appear throughout the play.

One aspect of the show that really stood out to me was the minimalism in the set. Instead of clogging the stage with lots of other elements, the choice to make the stage pieces almost completely not exist really opened up the concept of autism. Relating to people who battle such difficult things can sometimes be difficult and create boundaries between people who don't struggle with things like autism, so physically opening up the space and eliminating all excessive blockers really helped as an audience member.

The set had one moment that stood out to me in particular.  In one scene, Christopher's mother is talking to him and she is trying to validate and explain why she left. Instead of paying close attention to her words, he starts building this train track and slowly as the mothers monologue goes on, he builds a whole track around him. It closes him in and separates him from all his external fears. I thought this was really powerful as a directors choice. It created this incredible visual connection from what was going on in Christophers brain to the physical stage. I think that this was a genius choice as a director because it again gave the audience this opened door way to connect to Christopher as a person.

The sound in this production also really stood out to me. There was a consistent feeling of this ominous sound that went on throughout all the scene changes and sometimes in the scenes. As well as this, there were key noises like doorbells, and knocking, and other actions to help orient the audience. Especially because of the lack of visual aids to orient the audience this was incredibly helpful.

One scene I really liked that connected directly to sound cues was the train scene. In this scene, Christopher is at the train station and he is trying to figure out how to get to London. He doesn't yet understand the flow and patterns of a train station so, Siobhan comes into the scene on the side and tells him to watch the patterns and learn the ways of the train station before he takes action. Christopher then stands at the platform for a long period of time watching, " train coming, train stop, doors open, train going". He repeats this time and again and you suddenly gain this connection and deeper understanding to how Christopher's brain works. I think the repetition of the physical movements combined with sound cues really created this clear understanding of Christopher.

The show also used lighting greatly to their advantage. Throughout the whole production there was a track of lights that ran around the whole perimeter of the stage. I thought this was very smart because again it created this sense of separation and boundaries between Christopher and his peers.

My favorite actor in this show was Willjam. He had a very difficult character dynamic to attack and I thought it was really cool the way he portrayed his and Christophers dynamic. Throughout many moments in the show he was illustrated as this bad guy who was holding Christopher back, but there is a evident change of pace in the middle of the show and Ed becomes this sympathetic character who almost needs his sone to lean on and giver him something to do. I thought Will did and incredible job with this difficult character transition.

Overall, I really loved this play and although sometimes it was anxiety invoking for me, it really was well done and allowed for you to directly connect with all of the characters.