DNA: Plot and Characters

DNA by Dennis Kelly 🎭

For Component 3, Section A, you study **DNA**, a 2007 play by **Dennis Kelly**. A group of teenagers bully a boy, believe they have killed him, and cover it up. To answer the questions you need the **plot**, the **characters**, the **themes** and the original **staging context**.

Four sections, three places 🗺️

The play is built in **four sections**, moving between **three settings**: a street, a field and a wood. Each section opens with **Jan and Mark** in a rapid duologue, and features monologues spoken to **Phil**, who stays silent and keeps eating.

The plot in order

An interactive activity.

Match each character to their nature

Who leads the cover-up?

Which character is the silent mastermind who devises the plan to cover up what happened?

• Phil
• Leah
• John Tate
• Brian

The wider gang 👥

Other members matter too: - **John Tate**: the early leader, obsessed with control, who later disappears. - **Adam**: the bullied boy at the centre of events. - **Danny**: dreams of becoming a dentist and fears for his future. - **Richard**: takes over as leader later in the play.

Match each character to their role

The themes

Select the TWO central themes of DNA.

• Gangs, belonging and peer pressure
• Bullying and cruelty
• The joys of space travel
• Medieval kingship and battles

One versus many ⚖️

The play keeps returning to a moral question about **individual versus collective responsibility**: is it right to sacrifice **one person** for the good of **the many**? Kelly has said this is, for him, the central question of the play. The gang behaves in ways no single member might alone.

The big question

What is the central moral question of DNA?

• Whether to sacrifice an individual for the good of the many
• Whether money can buy happiness
• Whether to tell a small white lie
• Whether school uniform is fair

How it was first staged 🏛️

DNA was **first performed in 2008 at the National Theatre in London**, commissioned for the NT **Connections** project for young performers. It is staged **end-on** with **video projection** and a **minimal set**. Notably, though written in 2007, it features **no mobile phones**. You must reference this context in Section A.

Where and when?

Where and when was DNA first performed?

• The National Theatre in London, in 2008
• The Globe Theatre, in 1600
• Broadway, New York, in 1950
• A school hall, in 2015

DNA frame

DNA by Dennis Kelly follows a gang after _____ falls and is presumed dead. The silent _____ devises a cover-up. Its central question is whether to sacrifice the _____ for the many. It was first performed at the National _____ in 2008.

Odd one out

Which is a notable feature of DNA, given that it was written in 2007?

• It contains no mobile phones despite its era
• It is set in medieval times
• It has a cast of hundreds
• It is a musical full of songs