The Curious Incident of the BLOG in the Nighttime

The Broadway play “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime” is based on a novel by the British writer Mark Haddon. It tells the story of a fifteen year old boy named Christopher who suffers from Asperger Syndrome. The book is written from his perspective and how he sees the world.

The Broadway show “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime” is similar to the book. While the book is the Diary that Christopher writes while doing his detective work to find the murderer of his neighbor's dog, the play is that diary acted out. Christopher's teacher Siobhan reads parts of the diary out loud while they are acted on stage, while other parts are directly portrayed by the actors.

What I liked most about the play “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime” was the stage. It  looked like a box, its walls divided into equal squares. There were a great amount of special effects involved in the play. This included digital projection and a sort a drawing technique in which certain edges of the squares-that made up the walls and floor of the stage- were lit up to create shapes which could resemble buildings or other things such as furniture. There seemed to be no part of the stage that did not have a certain purpose to it. If it wasn’t a small table that could ascend from the floor, than it was a door that if opened would reveal a compartment filled with props.

As the play was performed from Christopher's perspective I felt like the stage allowed us as audience to view the world through his lines. When he imagined something, such as the red line that would tell him where to go, it would appear on stage for the audience to see. When Christopher enters the train station he soon gets overwhelmed by all the people and noise. To show this there was commercials projected on the back wall, the more overwhelmed Christopher got the more commercial was seen. It was read out loud and sound many were read at the same time making them incomprehensible.

The main flaw that I could see in the performance was that it was, just like a novel, a bit lengthy. Especially towards the end when Christopher arrives in London and then goes back to Swinden, it could have been shortened. Also they play didn’t seem to have the typical structure of plays with a climax, thought there were some scenes that had more action than others, the play overall was relatively steady. Thought this worked with the idea of it being told from Christopher's mind it nevertheless added to the play's partial lack of agitation.