Acts 1-2: The Crime & the Cover-Up
Act 1: The Crime Is Revealed
DNA opens with Mark and Jan on a street, speaking in short, panicked bursts. Through their fragmented conversation, the audience learns that something terrible has happened to a boy called Adam. The group were bullying him — making him walk across a grille, steal vodka, eat leaves — and things escalated. They threw stones at him as he crossed the grille, and he slipped and fell into the shaft below. The group believes Adam is dead.
Kelly deliberately withholds the full details of what happened. The audience never sees the incident directly. Instead, it is reconstructed through unreliable, overlapping accounts from Mark and Jan. This technique creates dramatic uncertainty — the audience is unsettled because they cannot be sure exactly what took place.
The group bullied Adam by making him walk across a grille, steal vodka, and eat leaves. The bullying escalated: they made Adam cross a grille over a shaft and threw stones at him until he slipped and fell. The group believes he is dead. Kelly never shows the incident on stage — all information comes from fragmented second-hand accounts.
The Group’s Panic
When the group gathers in the wood, the atmosphere is one of collective terror. John Tate, who was the group’s leader before the incident, tries to maintain control but is clearly out of his depth. He threatens anyone who uses the word “dead” and keeps insisting that he is holding the group together. His leadership is based on intimidation rather than competence, and it is already crumbling.
The group’s panic reveals their immaturity. They argue, blame each other, and talk over one another. Nobody takes responsibility. Kelly uses the fragmented, overlapping dialogue to show a group falling apart under pressure — exactly the kind of situation where someone calm and decisive can seize control.
John Tate bans the word “dead” and threatens to “bite their face” if anyone says it, pleading that he is “trying to keep everyone together.” His desperate repetition and forced assertions of control show a leader who has lost authority. The group humours him but does not genuinely respect him. When Phil finally speaks and offers a plan, the power shift is instant — John Tate is sidelined without a word of protest. Kelly uses John Tate to show that leadership based purely on aggression collapses the moment a real crisis arrives.
By Act 3 John Tate has stopped appearing — Leah says he “hasn’t been seen in weeks” — and in Act 4 Richard reports that he has “found God” and joined the Jesus Army. This could be read as genuine remorse, or as another form of avoidance — he finds a new authority figure (God) to tell him what to do, just as the group found Phil.
Phil’s Plan
Phil, who has been sitting in silence eating an ice cream while Leah talks at him, suddenly speaks. His plan is chillingly detailed. He tells them to break into Adam’s bedroom and take his shoes and a jumper without touching it, to fake footprints in the woods with the shoes, and to get a stranger’s DNA onto that jumper by dropping it in the street for a passer-by to pick up. Brian is made to tell the police that a fat postman with bad teeth exposed himself to him in the woods. The postman Phil invents does not exist.
What makes Phil’s intervention so striking is its calm precision. While everyone else is panicking, Phil thinks logically and strategically. He does not shout or threaten — he simply presents the plan as though it were obvious. The group immediately accepts his authority because he offers them what they desperately want: a way out. Kelly shows that in a crisis, people will follow anyone who appears confident, regardless of the morality of the solution.
Phil’s cover-up plan has three parts: (1) steal Adam’s shoes and a jumper from his bedroom, (2) fake footprints in the woods and get a stranger’s DNA onto the jumper, and (3) make Brian tell the police that a fat postman with bad teeth attacked him. The postman Phil invents does not exist. Phil gains leadership not through intimidation but through calm, strategic thinking.
Leah’s Monologues
Interwoven with the plot are Leah’s long, uninterrupted monologues, delivered to Phil in the field. Phil never responds. Leah talks about bonobos (peaceful apes), the nature of happiness, and what it means to be alive. These speeches seem random, but they carry deep thematic weight.
Leah’s monologues function as the play’s moral conscience. She is the only character who genuinely grapples with the ethics of what the group has done. Her references to bonobos — apes that resolve conflict through affection rather than violence — offer an alternative to the group’s behaviour. But Leah is trapped: she knows the cover-up is wrong, yet she cannot bring herself to defy Phil or leave the group.
Leah describes bonobos as creatures that use empathy and physical affection to resolve disputes, in contrast to chimpanzees (and, by implication, the group) who use violence and dominance. She says bonobos are “our nearest relative,” suggesting that humans have the capacity for peaceful resolution but choose aggression instead. This speech directly comments on the group’s choice to cover up their crime rather than confess. Kelly uses Leah to ask: if even apes can choose empathy over violence, why can’t we?
Phil’s silence during these monologues is itself significant. He offers no response, no comfort, and no moral engagement. His refusal to speak reduces Leah to a voice crying in the wilderness — heard by the audience but ignored by the one person she wants to reach.
Act 2: The Plan in Action
In Act 2 the plan has already been carried out, and it works too well. Cathy took the DNA from a real postman at the sorting office instead of from a stranger in the street, so the police match that DNA to a man who also fits Brian’s invented description. An innocent postman is arrested. The cover-up appears to work perfectly, and the group begins to feel a grim sense of relief. But Kelly signals that this relief is temporary — Mark and Jan’s street scene at the start of Act 2 reveals growing unease. The foundation for the play’s escalation in Acts 3 and 4 is already being laid.
Cathy, meanwhile, is thriving. She is excited about the cover-up and relishes her role in it. Her enthusiasm for the deception — and later for violence — makes her one of the play’s most unsettling characters. While others feel guilt or anxiety, Cathy feels empowered. Kelly uses her to show that group pressure does not affect everyone equally: some people discover that they enjoy cruelty.