The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time review, Cottesloe

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Creating a play from an international best seller ostensibly written by an autistic boy, is a big ask and it's a while before Simon Stephen's adaptation of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time really grips. This may be because Marianne Elliott's direction is slow burn, or that the viewer finds it hard to engage with a central character who lacks empathy and understanding.

The switch is flicked thirty minutes in, during a disturbing scene in which the narrator, Christopher, is hit by his father. The shock is palpable and what works so well in this dramatisation of Mark Haddon's novel is seeing a complex world in 3D. This is a boy who seeks comfort in numbers because human contact is too painful. His is a world where entering a stranger's house is terrifying, and love between parents and child can only be demonstrated by the touching of fingers. When Christopher's mother disappears and the dog next door is killed with a pitchfork, everything he has known is turned on its head.

Luke Treadaway in the lead role expertly unravels for us a highly intelligent, systems-oriented boy struggling to make sense of spontaneous behaviours that threaten his security. As his parents, themselves damaged by an emotionally dependent and demanding child, Nicola Walker and Paul Ritter provide moving insights into the struggles of families managing risk on a daily basis.

In conclusion: Bunny Christie's set is the icing on the cake. A light box of squares filled with surprises from multi level trains to dogs, both dead and alive, it is a curiosity in itself. Well worth a look.

References
Cottesloe Theatre, buy tickets
Michael Billington review in The Guardian