On Friday 7 October award-winning playwright, former teacher and Artistic Associate at the Lyric Hammersmith, Simon Stephens, who won Olivier and Tony awards for his adaptation for the National Theatre of Mark Haddon’s novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time will be speaking to children from Edinburgh City schools.
As part of a year-long project to inspire future authors, Stephens has made a commitment to visit schools across the UK from Autumn 2016 to Autumn 2017. In the Lothians, secondary school students aged between 13 and 15 from schools including Queensferry High School, Leith Academy, Broughton High School and Holyrood High School will attend the talks about careers in creative writing and the performing arts.
Simon Stephens said, “I want to go to schools throughout the country to meet young people and to talk to them about the possibility of working as a writer or an actor or a director. I want young people to know that a career in the theatre or in the performing arts is not something that happens to other people. I am proud that the warm way in which The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time has been received throughout the country might allow me to reach young people who had never met a playwright, or anybody who made their living out of the arts. I also might be able to give them a few good tips for their English Highers.”
Stephens’ adaptation of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time was added to the AQA GCSE in English literature set texts for English schools in 2014, making it the only modern play currently performing in the West End to be part of the AQA Post-1914 drama and prose section. His new translation of The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill has just completed a successful run at the National Theatre’s Olivier Theatre.
Following its successful run at the Festival Theatre in April 2015, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is back by popular demand for another 1-week run at the Festival Theatre Edinburgh, Mon 20 to Sat 25 February 2017.