DNA

by

Dennis Kelly

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on DNA makes teaching easy.

Leah Character Analysis

At first glance, the verbose Leah is ditzy, easily distracted, and self-obsessed. During her many afternoons sitting in a field with her silent boyfriend Phil, Leah muses aloud about big questions (such as the nature of life on earth and the foundation of reality) and small ones (such as whether Phil thinks she’s pretty, annoying, repulsive, or some combination of the three). As the play unfolds, however, Leah emerges as its moral center. When Mark and Jan bring Phil and Leah to meet with their group of friends in the woods, Phil and Leah soon learn that their schoolmate Adam is believed to be dead after a heartless prank gone terribly wrong. While Phil immediately begins unspooling a complicated plan to cover up the supposed murder, Leah protests, begging the others to do the right thing and tell the authorities about what’s happened. When Leah realizes that her voice—so often unheard by Phil—is also just noise to her friends, a change begins within her. Over the course of the play, as she watches her friends’ morals disintegrate and sees their psyches crumble under pressure, she begins to change. Witnessing Phil order the increasingly unstable Brian to murder Adam for real after Brian and Cathy find him living in the woods is the final straw for Leah—she leaves Phil, quits school, and moves elsewhere. In this way, Leah’s actions serve as a cautionary tale against the destabilizing and destructive effects of groupthink and peer pressure. So long as nothing affected her too directly, Leah was willing to put up with terrible treatment not just from her friends, but also from her boyfriend. The pressure to fit in, stay quiet, and maintain the status quo defined her life even as she searched desperately within herself for the answers to big, serious questions about life, love, and happiness. At the end of the play, Leah’s exit from the group has a profound effect on Phil in spite of his blatant mistreatment of her, and signals how just one individual choosing to stand up against bullying, brainwashing, and cruelty can portend change in that individual’s larger community.

Leah Quotes in DNA

The DNA quotes below are all either spoken by Leah or refer to Leah. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Right vs. Wrong Theme Icon
).
Scene 1 Quotes

Do I disgust you? I do. No, I do. No don’t because, it’s alright, it’s fine, I’m not gonna, you know, or whatever, you know it’s not the collapse of my, because I do have, I could walk out of here, there are friends, I’ve got, I’ve got friends, I mean alright, I haven’t got friends, not exactly, I haven’t, but I could, if I wanted, if I wanted, given the right, given the perfect, you know, circumstances.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 9
Explanation and Analysis:

You’re not scared. Nothing scares, there, I’ve said it; scared. Scared, Phil. I’m scared, they scare me, this place, everyone, the fear, the fear that everyone here, and I’m not the only one, I’m not the only one, Phil, I’m just the only one saying it, the fear that everyone here lives in, the brutal terror, it scares me, okay, I’ve said it and I am not ashamed.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 10
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 2 Quotes

No, I’m just wondering. I mean what is happy, what’s happy all about, who says you’re supposed to be happy, like we’re all supposed to be happy, happy is our natural, and any deviation from that state is seen as a failure, which in itself makes you more unhappy so you have to pretend to be even happier which doesn’t work because people can see that you’re pretending which makes them awkward and you can see that they can see that you’re pretending to be happy and their awkwardness is making you even more unhappy so you have to pretend to be even happier, it’s a nightmare.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 28
Explanation and Analysis:

Everything’s much better, though. I mean really, it is. Everyone’s working together. They’re a lot happier. Remember last month, Dan threatened to kill Cathy? well yesterday I saw him showing her his phone, like they were old friends. Last week Richard invited Mark to his party, bring a friend, anyone you like, can you believe that? Richard and Mark? Yep. Everyone’s happier. It’s pouring into the school, grief, grief is making them happy.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, Cathy, Mark, Danny, Richard
Page Number: 30
Explanation and Analysis:

No, no, yeah, no, actually, because that man, the man who, he doesn’t actually, I mean I’m not being fussy or anything, but the man who kidnapped Adam doesn’t actually exist, does he. Well does he?

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, A Boy/Adam, Brian
Page Number: 32
Explanation and Analysis:

PHIL: You’re going in.

BRIAN: No.

PHIL: Yes.

BRIAN: No, Phil –

PHIL: Yes, yes, shhhh, yes. Sorry. You have to go in. Or we’ll take you up the grille. […] We’ll throw you in.

RICHARD: Er, Phil.

DANNY: Is he serious?

LEAH: He’s always serious.

PHIL: We’ll take you up the grille now. Well get you by the arms. By the legs. And we’ll swing you onto the grille. We’ll throw rocks at you until you drop through. You’ll drop through. You’ll fall into the cold. Into the dark. You’ll land on Adam’s corpse and you’ll rot together.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil (speaker), Brian (speaker), Danny (speaker), Richard (speaker), A Boy/Adam
Page Number: 38
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 3 Quotes

LEAH: It’s incredible. The change. This place. You’re a miracle worker. Everyone’s happy. […] Funny thing is they’re all actually behaving better as well. I saw Jan helping a first year find the gym. Mark’s been doing charity work, for Christ’s sake. Maybe being seen as heroes is making them behave like heroes.

PHIL considers his waffle. Decides it needs more jam.

Yeah, everyone happy. Well it’s not all roses, you know. Brian’s on medication. […] John Tate hasn’t been seen in weeks, and the postman’s facing the rest of his life in prison, but, you know, omelettes and eggs, as long as you’ve your waffle, who cares.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, Brian, John Tate, Jan, Mark
Related Symbols: Food and Drink
Page Number: 45-46
Explanation and Analysis:

LEAH: How’ve you been living?

ADAM: In the hedge.

LEAH: No, how?

What have you been eating?

ADAM: You can eat anything. I eat things.

Nothing dead, I don’t

insects, grass, leaves, all good, but nothing, I caught a rabbit once and ate that, its fur was soft, warm, but nothing, I found a dead bird and ate some of that but it made me sick so nothing, nothing dead, that’s the rule, nothing

Beat.

What?

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), A Boy/Adam (speaker), Phil
Related Symbols: Food and Drink
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:

BRIAN: That was great!

PHIL: You just do what Cathy says.

BRIAN: I am brilliant at doing what people say.

LEAH: No! Stop, don’t, don’t, Phil, don’t, what are you doing, what are you...

PHIL: He’s dead, everyone thinks he’s dead. What difference will it make?

She stares at him.

LEAH: But he’s not dead. He’s alive.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil (speaker), Brian (speaker), A Boy/Adam, Cathy
Page Number: 58
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 4 Quotes

And in that second, Phil, I knew that there was life on other planets. I knew we weren’t alone in the universe, I didn’t just think it or feel it, I knew it, I know it, it was as if the universe was suddenly shifting and giving me a glimpse, this vision that could see everything, just for a fraction of a heartbeat of a second. But I couldn’t see who they were or what they were doing or how they were living.

How do you think they’re living, Phil?

How do you think they’re living?

Related Characters: Richard (speaker), Leah, Phil
Page Number: 63
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire DNA LitChart as a printable PDF.
DNA PDF

Leah Quotes in DNA

The DNA quotes below are all either spoken by Leah or refer to Leah. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Right vs. Wrong Theme Icon
).
Scene 1 Quotes

Do I disgust you? I do. No, I do. No don’t because, it’s alright, it’s fine, I’m not gonna, you know, or whatever, you know it’s not the collapse of my, because I do have, I could walk out of here, there are friends, I’ve got, I’ve got friends, I mean alright, I haven’t got friends, not exactly, I haven’t, but I could, if I wanted, if I wanted, given the right, given the perfect, you know, circumstances.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 9
Explanation and Analysis:

You’re not scared. Nothing scares, there, I’ve said it; scared. Scared, Phil. I’m scared, they scare me, this place, everyone, the fear, the fear that everyone here, and I’m not the only one, I’m not the only one, Phil, I’m just the only one saying it, the fear that everyone here lives in, the brutal terror, it scares me, okay, I’ve said it and I am not ashamed.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 10
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 2 Quotes

No, I’m just wondering. I mean what is happy, what’s happy all about, who says you’re supposed to be happy, like we’re all supposed to be happy, happy is our natural, and any deviation from that state is seen as a failure, which in itself makes you more unhappy so you have to pretend to be even happier which doesn’t work because people can see that you’re pretending which makes them awkward and you can see that they can see that you’re pretending to be happy and their awkwardness is making you even more unhappy so you have to pretend to be even happier, it’s a nightmare.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil
Page Number: 28
Explanation and Analysis:

Everything’s much better, though. I mean really, it is. Everyone’s working together. They’re a lot happier. Remember last month, Dan threatened to kill Cathy? well yesterday I saw him showing her his phone, like they were old friends. Last week Richard invited Mark to his party, bring a friend, anyone you like, can you believe that? Richard and Mark? Yep. Everyone’s happier. It’s pouring into the school, grief, grief is making them happy.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, Cathy, Mark, Danny, Richard
Page Number: 30
Explanation and Analysis:

No, no, yeah, no, actually, because that man, the man who, he doesn’t actually, I mean I’m not being fussy or anything, but the man who kidnapped Adam doesn’t actually exist, does he. Well does he?

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, A Boy/Adam, Brian
Page Number: 32
Explanation and Analysis:

PHIL: You’re going in.

BRIAN: No.

PHIL: Yes.

BRIAN: No, Phil –

PHIL: Yes, yes, shhhh, yes. Sorry. You have to go in. Or we’ll take you up the grille. […] We’ll throw you in.

RICHARD: Er, Phil.

DANNY: Is he serious?

LEAH: He’s always serious.

PHIL: We’ll take you up the grille now. Well get you by the arms. By the legs. And we’ll swing you onto the grille. We’ll throw rocks at you until you drop through. You’ll drop through. You’ll fall into the cold. Into the dark. You’ll land on Adam’s corpse and you’ll rot together.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil (speaker), Brian (speaker), Danny (speaker), Richard (speaker), A Boy/Adam
Page Number: 38
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 3 Quotes

LEAH: It’s incredible. The change. This place. You’re a miracle worker. Everyone’s happy. […] Funny thing is they’re all actually behaving better as well. I saw Jan helping a first year find the gym. Mark’s been doing charity work, for Christ’s sake. Maybe being seen as heroes is making them behave like heroes.

PHIL considers his waffle. Decides it needs more jam.

Yeah, everyone happy. Well it’s not all roses, you know. Brian’s on medication. […] John Tate hasn’t been seen in weeks, and the postman’s facing the rest of his life in prison, but, you know, omelettes and eggs, as long as you’ve your waffle, who cares.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil, Brian, John Tate, Jan, Mark
Related Symbols: Food and Drink
Page Number: 45-46
Explanation and Analysis:

LEAH: How’ve you been living?

ADAM: In the hedge.

LEAH: No, how?

What have you been eating?

ADAM: You can eat anything. I eat things.

Nothing dead, I don’t

insects, grass, leaves, all good, but nothing, I caught a rabbit once and ate that, its fur was soft, warm, but nothing, I found a dead bird and ate some of that but it made me sick so nothing, nothing dead, that’s the rule, nothing

Beat.

What?

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), A Boy/Adam (speaker), Phil
Related Symbols: Food and Drink
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:

BRIAN: That was great!

PHIL: You just do what Cathy says.

BRIAN: I am brilliant at doing what people say.

LEAH: No! Stop, don’t, don’t, Phil, don’t, what are you doing, what are you...

PHIL: He’s dead, everyone thinks he’s dead. What difference will it make?

She stares at him.

LEAH: But he’s not dead. He’s alive.

Related Characters: Leah (speaker), Phil (speaker), Brian (speaker), A Boy/Adam, Cathy
Page Number: 58
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene 4 Quotes

And in that second, Phil, I knew that there was life on other planets. I knew we weren’t alone in the universe, I didn’t just think it or feel it, I knew it, I know it, it was as if the universe was suddenly shifting and giving me a glimpse, this vision that could see everything, just for a fraction of a heartbeat of a second. But I couldn’t see who they were or what they were doing or how they were living.

How do you think they’re living, Phil?

How do you think they’re living?

Related Characters: Richard (speaker), Leah, Phil
Page Number: 63
Explanation and Analysis: