Last night, I had the chance to check out The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, based on the bestselling book by author Mark Haddon. The New York Times gave it a rave review, so Matt and I jumped at getting tickets. Two words: Go now. Here, my top three reasons to see the show.
1. The acting. The lead character, Christopher Boone, is played by Alex Sharp, a recent Juilliard grad who is making his Broadway debut. I wouldn’t be surprised if he receives a Best Actor Tony Award for his role. He’s brilliant. I had a hard time taking my eyes off of him during the almost 2 1/2 hour play, he’s so captivating. The role also requires an impressive amount of physicality (for example, any touch by another human being sends him into hysterics). Alex handles this seamlessly.
2. The set design. It’s simplistic, but remarkable—and a little bit of sensory overload, which perfectly reflects how the lead character feels a lot of the time. The stage is a sort of black box version of graph paper that also doubles as a touch screen. The actors’ moves are so perfectly choreographed that a single step lights up the stage, creates a map, or an explosion of digital numbers. At one point it becomes a subway platform—the next an escalator that Christopher can walk down. I loved it.
3. The story. Truth be told, I never read the book. Matt did, and he said the show reflects it well—he’s comfortable with the adaptation. Since I didn’t know the back story (and wouldn’t let Matt give me any spoilers before sitting down!), it was magical and full of surprises. Like I said, I had a hard time taking my eyes off the stage from start to finish.
OK, so tell me: Will you see this play?
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