Company of DNA | Photo by Elana Emer
Lord of the Flies is a novel that, in my youth, left a significant mark on me. A visceral, exciting and thoughtful work, it helped shape my sensibilities. Dennis Kelly’s DNA, presented here by Icarus Theatre in a resonant production, shares some, yes, DNA with William Golding’s novel. Like those stranded schoolboys, the urban kids of this story feel simultaneously bolstered and threatened by the very society they’ve constructed. And as they devolve throughout the story’s grotesque trajectory, we are aware of, at the fringes of their cloistered unit, a deceptively safer world: the real world—a construct that is, on some level, as much a myth as their own sense of control and meaning.
Having recently seen Concord Floral in the same venue, this feels like a companion piece. The hormonally charged, exploratory flailings of youth are a whole vibe this theatre season.
One of their number, Adam, is dead. Though there was an actual event, the cause of his demise, we understand intuitively, isn’t as simple as the dubious facts suggest—no, these teenagers and we, the rapt audience, know that everyone exists here in a Schrödinger’s murder sort of scenario, were each one of them is simultaneously guilty and not, until you land on whatever moralistic stance best suits your interpretation.
Erik Richards’ production is earthy, familiar and disconcerting. A pile of discarded wooden pallets with a garbage can is a communal meeting place. Tarps, covered in graffiti, are unnerving portals into a world of distinct consequences they are somehow set apart from. The space is grounded by a carpet of dead autumn leaves that rustle about and stick to clothes.
For the most part, I quite loved this, but the structure of the play somewhat frustrated me—specifically, they way Kelly breaks the ensemble cast up into a series of pairs and smaller clusters, disrupting the momentum and urgency of the group dynamic to develop key relationships and thematic concerns—important, of course, but the technique here reinforces Kelly’s authorship at the expense of, well, at least my full immersion in the story. The play’s disquieting ideas are best conveyed when the tension remains unbroken and the stakes increasingly heightened.
We spend a significant amount of time with Ray (Chantal Grace) and Leah (Morgan Roy) alone. Grace’s Ray is a silent, enigmatic presence in these episodes, her body language and understated facial expressions providing answer to Leah’s plaintive scrambling to be validated. Though entirely endearing and sympathetic, Leah is also exasperating in her persistent needling. Roy is confidently wretched with such an offbeat and sincere charisma. The air is thick with unspoken feelings hanging in the air around Leah’s rambling. We are left to intuit the specifics of their relationship, an ambiguity I appreciate. They are, to me, estranged yet inseparable lovers.
Mike (Seydina Soumah) and Jan (Avril Brigden) have a distinctive and expressive partnership. They are a duo, in an almost vaudevillian sense. Their dialogue features excessive repetition and they often finish each other sentences. It is a stylistic contrivance aping David Mamet that I found thrilling in the moment, but ultimately too self-aware.
In both of these cases, the actors absolutely make these scenes their own and Richards’ direction gives the rhythms some effective theatrical punctuation with expressive sound, light and movement, but I found them too removed from the urgent reality of the situation, muting the sense of desperation as these kids scramble to erase evidence of their complicity.
Those group scenes, man, they just swallowed me whole—so tense and authentic, I found myself holding my breath though so much of their fraught negotiations. A feature of Kelly’s text that really hits is the way characters leave so much deliberately unspoken, as if they are struggling to connect across a minefield of forbidden ideas. The final ensemble scene, bathed in the flickering firelight from the trash can, is subtly surreal and truly haunting in its implications. Jeremy Foot is an astonishing presence here in a vulnerable, abject and delirious mode. In the program, he’s credited without a photo simply as “Boy.” This is, I assume, a strategic choice to avoid spoiling his significance and I have no intention to undermine that effort.
Shout out to Jonah Fleming, whose portrayal of a manipulative bully has understated menace. Brennan Bielefeld’s Danny is a quirky oddball who adds some much-appreciated comic relief to the dire tension, though I do find his dentistry obsession, as written, a bit forced. Emily Anne Corcoran’s Cathy provides a darkly manic enthusiasm. As Bryn, Zaniq King is genuinely distressing in her hysterics—both the laughter and the tears. Haneen Paima and Ivan Anand, less featured personae, but still an essential part of the dynamic with their quiet intensity.
With this deeply considered and atmospheric production, Icarus Theatre continues to up their game. This is a rich and intriguing play, so emphatically rendered!
DNA
November 6 to November 15, 2025
The Theatre Centre, BMO Incubator
(1115 Queen St. W)
70 minutes (no intermission)
Chantal Grace and Morgan Roy in DNA | Photo by Elana Emer