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Pilot Theatre’s adaptation of Malorie Blackman’s acclaimed speculative fiction is a masterpiece of heightened adolescent turmoil
Image: Lewis Tidy and Brianna Douglas by Von Fox Promotions
One way to find out that one of your favourite childhood books has become a GCSE set text is to show up at a stage adaptation of said novel and discover swathes of Key Stage 4 students already neatly seated in rows. Pilot Theatre’s adaptation of Malorie Blackman’s acclaimed speculative fiction Noughts & Crosses is quite fortunately tailor-made for this specific audience.
Noughts & Crosses’ premise has never been a particularly complex one; the story’s racially-segregated alternative timeline in which Crosses (darker-skinned people) subjugate lighter-skinned Noughts mirrors our own society’s historical (and not-so-historical) racism and prejudices. But its sophistication comes from its structure: dual first person narrators show us both sides of the divide simultaneously, all told from the perspective of two young people roughly the same age as its target audience.
As a young person reading Noughts & Crosses, the experience becomes an exercise in discernment. At what point does naivety stop being a valid excuse for being another cog in the wheel of oppression? How much oppression can one person face before violent means justify the end of their persecution? These are the questions that confront the audiences at Pilot Theatre’s stage production.
This adaptation relies quite heavily on the trusty monologue – though it’s difficult to blame them seeing as the source material itself is predominantly internal monologue. But Brianna Douglas’ Sephy Hadley and Lewis Tidy’s Callum McGregor anchor the story and their stage mates, guiding them and the audience through their world of heightened social and political tensions. Emotions run high throughout Noughts & Crosses, and both capture the adolescent turmoil of struggling to find a place within a society not made for you in a way that seemed to chime with the younger members of the audience.
But although it comes in at over two hours excluding the interval, Noughts & Crosses misses some crucial elements of the original text. To learn more about the tragedy of Lynette McGregor, what triggered Meggie and Jasmine’s feud, or what becomes of Callie Rose McGregor, you’ll have to stick to the original novels. Especially if you’re to write an essay on it in your upcoming GCSE exam.
Noughts & Crosses is at Northern Stage, Newcastle until Saturday 7th March.
