London, UK – A play centered on a teenaged boy suspected of having Asperger’s syndrome has received a Tony award for “Best Play” in 2015.
With both the novel and play’s success, the film industry has now taken notice and thus optioned the rights to turn it into a feature film with Steve Kloves, a Harry Potter screenwriter, at the helm. However although Haddon is pleased with the success of the book and has signed over the rights to the film, the novelist has expressed reservations regarding the influence it will have on autism dialogue throughout the globe.
Talking with a group at the Telegraph Hay Festival in 2012 he said,
“It is used as a textbook for social workers, and for policemen, which is something I heard recently. I never meant it to be a textbook.”
Haddon therefore stresses that it is important for families of those with ASD to learn about the disorder in order to educate themselves and thus provide support for their loved ones and not simply rely on his book or the film and play adaptations of it to achieve that end.
Hadden has wondered how the story will be presented on screen but appears less concerned with Kloves as the screenwriter:
“He wrote all but one of the two Harry Potter films but also wrote and directed The Fabulous Baker Boys and Wonder Boys, two films which could have been terribly sentimental but weren’t. So I think I’m in good hands.”
The show, entitled “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time”, is a London import based on a hit novel written by author Mark Haddon. In it, Haddon describes the exploits of a 15 year old boy who seeks to find a dog’s murderer. Adapted by playwright Simon Stephens, it provides a sweeping yet detailed account of the youngster’s journey through a masterful use of imagery and unusual props including constellations and even live rats.
Sources: ABC News: ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog’ Wins Best Play Tony Award
The Telegraph UK: Mark Haddon – don’t use Curious Incident… as an autism “textbook”