CL Play Reflection

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Reflection

On November 15th, 2019, I saw Cheshire Academy’s Drama Club put on the production of “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time,” by Simon Stephens in the Black Box Theater on campus. This production told told the story of a Boy named Christopher, who struggled with autism, and how he delt with family issues within his home, figuring out who he is as a person, and being held as a suspect for the murder of one of his neighbor’s dog. There were many themes in this play as well. The most important theme was the importance of self recognition. Early in the play, Christopher does not really know who he is. He has to struggle and go through many obstacles in order to find himself. But he persevered, got through the tough times, and by the end of the play he had a good idea of who he was as a person.

I thought the director made great decisions when choosing staging, lighting, and sound. Firstly, the staging in this production was not too busy or too boring. I felt the props used added to the production in a satisfactory way, and made me feel as if I was witnessing each scene in real life instead of just in a play. For example, I thought the table/desk, the notebook, and the letters the Christopher from his mother played big parts in this production. Ed slammed the desk once or twice which was able to show emotion and he also threw both the notebook and the letters after Christopher found them. This showed when Ed got overly mad and couldn’t handle himself or his emotions. Secondly, I felt the lighting made this production 100 times better. For example, the use of the LED lights on the bottom of the stage to represent the train station. Those lights and the sound of that scene made me feel as if I was truly at a train station and made the scene feel very authentic. I feel like the director’s vision was to show how Christopher interacts with different types of people. For example, he was not as comfortable talking to strangers as he was with his parents or Siobhan. Throughout the play, Christopher’s mood changes multiple times as he figures out who he can trust and who he cannot. This was definitely part of the director’s plan, and was executed well by the actors.

The opening scene of the play was my favorite scene of the entire play. The blue lights were on, the actors came on stage and sat on the sides, Christopher was front and center with the dog, the music came on and then all of the actors started circling Christopher and the dog which set the tone perfectly for this production. This scene was unlike any other opening scene I have ever scene. There was a lot of swearing, anger, and confusion, which gave the audience a look into Christopher’s brain. This scene brought the audience right into the action of the play instead of easing their way into it, which was different from other plays which was something I enjoyed.

Overall, Willjam was my favorite actor for many different reasons. Firstly, I felt the woman that played Christopher did an amazing job. She represented him in the best and most accurate way I have seen, and thought she absolutely crushed it. But, I felt Willjam’s role in the play was harder to portray, and I felt he did an amazing job. He had to portray happiness, sadness, anger, and confusion. He expressed each emotion extremely well, and gave a great performance.

I thoroughly enjoyed this production. I liked it because the actors were very into it, as an audience we could tell that they all worked extremely hard to prepare for it, and they made me feel like  I was truly there and was able to feel all of the emotions from the actors. I was able to learn that there is a lot more that goes into a production than just costumes and scripts. Everyone who worked on this had a specific job to do and they did it well. Everyone from the actors to the directors made this production the best that they could, and they exceeded  any and all expectations.