THE CURIOUS TALENT OF SIMON STEPHENS
Playwright Simon Stephens must be Britain’s most prolific dramatist. So far this year he’s had FIVE major plays on the London stage and there’s more to come… Our film collaboration with Simon, “Sea Wall”, featuring BAFTA winning Sherlock actor Andrew Scott, continues to delight, thrill and seriously upset people (in a good way) in more than 40 countries.
Earlier this year it was #1 on the IMDB short film movie ratings charts, out of a mere 247,000 films. Currently playing at the National Theatre is Simon’s adaptation of the brilliant Mark Haddon novel, The curious incident of the dog in the night-time. It has received unanimously rapturous reviews from critics and theatre goers and recently played across the UK and around the world at over 300 cinemas as part of the NTLive project.
It’s an astonishing piece of theatre that explores the mind of Christopher, a teenage boy with an unspecified condition which may or may not be autism. The play, directed by Marianne Elliott, features mime, innovative stage and lighting techniques and has at its heart wonderful performances from a cast led by Luke Treadaway as the eponymous hero. Go and see it if you get a chance, it is simply brilliant. As well as “Dog”, Simon’s output this year already includes The Trial of Ubu, A Doll’s House, Three Kingdoms (a collaborative piece staged in three countries with a pan-European cast) and Morning which premiered at the Edinburgh Traverse and completes its run at the Lyric, Hammersmith this weekend, at the same time Simon’s play Harper Regan begins a run off Broadway… busy lad.
We’re looking forward to more film collaborations with Simon in the future… when he has time.
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