of displacement

Wednesday night we hosted a wonderful evening of performance in our Aki Studio Theatre. Unearthing So(u)los was a collection of three works in progress exploring themes of decolonization with an eye to building bridges. Each piece was unique, immersive, thoughtful, and beautiful. In the spirit of development an informal talk back was held at the end of the night by the artists: nishaahuja, Victoria Mata and Rehana Tejpar.

In this talk back an important question was asked by an audience member. They were interested to know how the decision to perform in Daniels Spectrum, a shiny new beacon of the Regent Park redevelopment, could have been made considering the themes within their pieces and their own relationship with communities of displaced people. The question didn’t go unanswered: nisha stated that they considered ‘Daniels Spectrum’ the name on the outside of the building and spoke to her relationship with Native Earth. Victoria referenced the lack of affordable performance space in the city where one could put on such a showcase. In the end it was clear that the question had spurred a conversation, and that the conversation was not over.

nisha working on a Keith Barker play at Weesageechak 24. Photo by Scott Benesiinaabandan

Native Earth recognizes the responsibility that goes hand in hand with managing any venue. We acknowledge that this venue in particular comes with a deeper need to connect with our community and the community of Regent Park. Frankly, this excites and invigorates us. We often speak together about decolonizing the process of creation in theatre, and taking down ruling hierarchical systems in our work. Now we get to really do that, make our own rules, and invite others to do the same.

So, let’s chat.

-          Rae

“Unearthing” was a presentation of three solo works in progress including “Un-settling” by nisha ahuja, “Arterias” by Victoria Mata and “Love Flows Down” by Rehana Tejpar

nisha ahuja will be performing with “The Besetting of Reena Virk”  with the Subtle Vigilance Collective on Dec 1^st at 8 PM and Dec 2^nd at 2 PM in the Aki Studio Theatre. 

A Song For Tomorrow

(l to r) Jeff Yung and Jasmine Chen. Photograph by Gein Wong.

An honouring of our parents’ journeys. An affirmation of hard choices. An elegy that’s told in reverse time. New Harlem Productions partnered with Eventual Ashes to stage Christina Wong’s play, A Song For Tomorrow, at Theatre Passe Muraille for the 2012 SummerWorks Festival.

The pride I feel at producing this moving script is made all the more satisfying because the play was supported by NEPA through OAC’s Creator’s Reserve program and developed with dramaturge Philip Adams (another NEPA stalwart). The team is rounded out by NEPA favourites including a starkly suggestive set by Jackie Chau, striking lighting by David DeGrow and the superior wrangling skills of production manager, Rae Powell.

I can’t hardly wait for you all to see some elegant performances by Jasmine Chen and Jeff Yung, who have been working it out in rehearsal space generously provided by Obsidian Theatre but have also been sighted in character at the T&T night market.

It’s all pulled together by director Gein Wong, whose work we’ve seen recently in Intent City at Mayworks, and will see again when she co-directs the premiere of her own play, Hiding Words (For You), at Enwave in the fall. Check it all the way out!

- Donna-Michelle St. Bernard 

Sat. August 11, 2:00 PM
Thurs. August 16, 7:00 PM
Sun. August 19, 11:30 AM

Sun. August 12, 7:00 PM
Fri. August 17, 2:00 PM

Mon. August 13, 9:30 PM
Sat. August 18, 4:30 PM

For tickets click here.

Tawaw

Tawaw.  It means welcome in Cree, and I have picked up quite a bit of Cree out here in Saskatchewan, over the course of a nine-month residency at the Saskatoon Public Library.  (I used to feel bad that I had more te reo Māori than my own language, Anishinaabemowin, but one of my elders told me to learn the language wherever I was, it all helps).  And I did feel truly welcomed to this community of readers and writers and learners.

From September to the end of May, I had over 170 appointments with more than sixty individual writers in my office at the Library. I saw poets, fiction writers, science fiction writers, playwrights, non-fiction writers, memoirists, first time writers and published authors.  On the days I was not available to the community, I was writing. In my nine months, I wrote an adaptation of The Birds (Aristophanes, not Hitchcock) and several papers about Aboriginal theatre in Canada, which magically transform themselves into chapters in this book about Native theatre. I have spoken about Turtle Gals’ work – The Only Good Indian, The Scrubbing Project, The Triple Truth – about Marie Clements’ Tombs of the Vanishing Indian, The Unnatural and Accidental Women – about Daniel David Moses’ Almighty Voice and His Wife and Brebeuf’s Ghost, about Melanie J Murrays’ A Very Polite Genocide and Native Earth’s Death of a Chief.

I also had occasion to go into classrooms and hospitals and other community spaces to talk about the power of putting the words in the right order.  In a school library, I learned the word tawaw, from a small group of students. 

Photo of Yvette Nolan courtesy of Saskatoon Public Library

The teacher-librarian had assembled grade 6’s and 7’s to hear me talk about being the Writer in Residence, and to encourage literacy.  “A special class will be joining us,” the teacher librarian explained, “called Tawaw.”   The boys of Tawaw have, for whatever reason, not succeeded in the mainstream, and Tawaw was built to support them, to give them tools to achieve.

I had prepared a writing exercise, very simple. Introduce yourself, but in the third person. Tell us something about yourself, in the third person. Tell us something about your dreams – what are you going to be when you grow up. All in the third person.

The students wrote for ten minutes or so, and then we shared.  “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, please allow me to introduce Alicia!  Alicia loves Justin Bieber, and she is going to be a veterinarian when she grows up!”  Wildly thunderous applause. That kind of thing.  I kept returning to the Tawaw table to see if one of the boys would share. Uh uh. No way.

When most of the class had shared their introductions and ambitions, some fanciful, some prosaic, I was starting to wrap up the class, and one of the boys from the Tawaw group raised his hand.  “I’ll go.”

He stood up and read his words.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce you to Clifton. Clifton is a good friend to his sister Savannah and his best friend Clayton. Clifton is going to be a stonemason, and a hockey player, and a husband and a father. “

He read straight to me, and behind me I could feel his teachers swelling with joy and pride and hope.  I breathed to keep the tears from appearing. Clifton (the student I am calling Clifton) had imagined himself into an adult, into a trade, into healthy relationships. Into a future. He had put the words together and put the idea they expressed into the air.  From his lips to the Creator’s ear.

Tawaw. Welcome, Come in. There’s room.

- Yvette Nolan 

Saying goodbye to King Lear: The dream is over but the memories will never die

Prior to the start of rehearsals for King Lear at the NAC, I found myself downplaying the adjectives; “revolutionary”, “ground-breaking” even “historical”. I am tired of being the mandate, the spectacle on display. And besides, it really wasn’t a first. There have been all-Aboriginal Shakespeare productions. Well, 1 or 2 maybe…over the last 100 years.

Don’t get me wrong. I know I was blessed to be in the show, to be playing not only Cordelia but also the Fool. Wow. Pinch. We are at the stage that August Schellenberg dreamed we would be, we have the talent to pull it off, several times over, so I thanked the grandmothers and grandfathers every day for the opportunity. But I resisted the hype.

I wanted the audience to come because the cast was in command of the language, the direction superb and the show beautifully lit, staged and costumed. I wanted it to be spectacular yet common, a show that could be in any given city, theatre season, year.

But that kind of luxury is reserved for a different type of production and the experience in King Lear reminded me that I am not that kind of actor. This was not just another show, another gig.

First there was an opportunity to work with one of the most generous actors I have met, August Schellenberg, not to mention how great it was to hang with his amazing wife Joan. (Please write that book Joan, I can’t wait to hear more stories!) There was the beautiful resonance of Billy and Tantoo’s Cree accents owning the text and Lorne Cardinal leading us in prayer circle. I witnessed the exponential growth of Jeremy Proulx as an actor, heard the spine-tingling voice of Meegwun Fairbrother night after night and wept each time Gordon White said, “My name is Edgar”. That was especially hard because I came on stage seconds later supposedly dead in the arms of Lear, hiding the small tear running down my cheek. 

 

I marveled at Kevin Loring’s eloquence with the text, had fun as the Fool playing off Monique’s Goneril (easily done from our years of working together as Turtle Gals) and tried my best to keep up with Ryan Cunningham in the King Lear push-up club. The hearts of Keith Barker and Craig Lauzon were so large they burst onto the stage, smilingly. Equally inspiring was the inclusion of the Four Nations Exchange with Suzanne Keeptwo at the helm. These dedicated, generous, community members filled the stage with their love and the King Lear FB page with pictures. The group included the Hendricks family (Keith, Theresa and their 2 beautiful girls), who exemplified what a family unit can be. (Jordyn, I will never forget our not-so-secret handshake).

Cast of King Lear - photograph by Fred Cattroll

These are the memories that make it difficult to say goodbye, evident as we stood in a circle on the stage prior to our last show. We filled the theatre with sage, prayers and tears. There were 51 one of us: Lear and his 50 followers. This was ground-breaking, revolutionary and historical, not because we can or can’t do Shakespeare, but because we worked as a community in a commercial venue, we brought our prayers and discussions about culture to Canada’s National stage, we reclaimed the territory by placing our footsteps in the halls of the NAC and most importantly because no one knows if this will happen again any time soon. 

- Jani Lauzon

Turtlesback

For a while now Native Earth had been talking about different ways to get our stories out. Meanwhile, Seneca College wanted to do some applied research through the Canada Interactive Fund through HeritageCanada. From the beginning it was a partnership in the true sense of the word.

Given the challenge of providing content that would challenge the Seneca researchers to come up with top-quality, innovative work we set out to build a portal that had several components:

·     A connection to our blog

·     A demonstration of our Made to Order theatre offerings

·     A computer game based on a creation story

·     A GPS app that would tell people a little about the history and culture of the land upon which they were standing.

As we approached the first meeting last spring Donna-Michelle St. Bernard and I figured that if Seneca agreed to do one or two of those things it would be great. Imagine our delight when the folks at Seneca agreed to do all four. Imagine our further delight when the folks at Heritage Canada agreed to fund all the activities!!! That meant we had to do it.

The path of working with the entire team from Seneca was a combination of education for all involved. We learned the complications of compositing an animated baby into video of a car that is supposed to be moving. They learned about the culture of the Aboriginal people in a way that was a far cry from the world of Walt Disney. We all learned the lessons of mutual respect and the bond that forms when people work on something important together.

The official launch of Turtlesback will be in the middle of next month (watch this space for the announcement). I will leave the official ‘thank yous’ for that occasion. But, I do need to take a moment to thank Donna-Michelle. The ideas that sprang from her fruitful imagination certainly provided the researchers and animators some wonderful material. As well, Laura Jo Gunter of Seneca College who had the vision to call Native Earth and had the vision to see the benefits this project would have for her students, her institution, Native Earth and our people across this Turtle Island.

-Jed DeCory

Augie's Dream

When the Ecstasy of  Rita Joe opened at the Vancouver Playhouse in 1967, after a pregnant pause, Canadian Theatre was born. It was at this time that, Actor/ Director / Producer John Juliani approached his dear friend August “Augie” Schellenberg about how wonderful Chief Dan George would be as King Lear; and the idea of an all-Aboriginal Lear was born.

“They asked Chief Dan George if he’d do it.

But Dan George said No.

We asked him, why not? It’s a good part.

Dan laughed and shook his head, Too many lines, too many lines.”

-  August Schellenberg

August vowed that one day he would play Lear with a cast of Aboriginal actors and for the next four decades He and John tried to piece that dream together. The most immediate and obvious obstacle at the time was the lack of Professional Aboriginal Actors with the chops to pull off such an ambitious production.

I first heard about the “ Native Lear” in 2009 while working with August on the Western Canada Theatre / National Arts Centre co-production of The Ecstasy of Rita Joe. Directed by Yvette Nolan, this production of Rita Joe, billed as the 50^th Anniversary production, is the first and only production directed by an Aboriginal director ever to be featured on the main stage of the National Arts Centre, Theatre Hall.

During the run Augie would tell us stories about his dream of doing an all Native Lear.  A lot has changed since 1967. Today we certainly have the actors to pull it off. What we needed was a director; brave enough to take it on and more importantly a producer with the resources to accomplish such a bold and ambitious production. It was clear to us that if anyone were going to do an Aboriginal Lear, it would be Peter Hinton at the National Arts Centre of Canada.  We just had to convince him that it was as good an idea as we all thought it was.

Augie met briefly with Peter during the run of The Ecstasy of Rita Joe, and pitched the idea, but he left the meeting feeling that Peter wasn’t all that interested.

While I was a member of the National Arts Centre English Theatre Acting Company in 2010-11, I made a point to remind Peter Hinton and Paula Danckert, the company dramaturge, about the Native Lear. In my research I came across a series of Manga versions of Shakespearean Plays written by Post Modernist Professor Richard Appignanesi. One of the Manga’s featured a Mohican Lear. I brought the book to Dankert in the hope that it would inspire them, to see the merit of such a production.  The dramaturgy of the Manga was quite sound. The narrative fit neatly into the context of a North America where the French, the English, and the Native tribes at relatively equal strength and the Colonial Powers vying for land and title. To me the comic book presented an example of how this story might fit an Aboriginal cast.

Whether or not the comic book influenced them, I don’t know. However, it is one of many reference books sitting in the rehearsal hall today. And at long last August Schellenberg is playing King Lear with all Aboriginal cast supporting him, and John Juliani’s son, Alessandro, is designing the sound for the show.

An Aboriginal community group called the Four Nations Exchange is also part of the production. Making up the “village” are twenty-seven community members, add that to the cast of thirteen and there will be forty Aboriginal actors on the main stage of the National Arts Centre on opening night!

The rehearsals have been electric, demanding, exhilarating. Everyone is meeting the challenges that the text requires, the weird Shakespearean syntax, the emotional scale of the piece and the mountainous speeches.  For Tantoo Cardinal (Regan) and Billy Merasty (Gloucester) English is their second language! We are all excited and terrified of the enormity of this show. And we all recognize the significance of it.

I am humbled to be amongst the artists in the room.

I have never felt so honoured to be a theatre artist. For me, playing Edmund in this production is the role of a lifetime. I can only imagine what is like for August, to have carried this dream for so long to finally be doing it, in the best possible way. In the rehearsal hall the other day, we had all the village members and the speaking actors together rehearsing Act 1 scene 1 for the first time. The large rehearsal hall at the NAC was full. August came over to me before we were about to begin, he had this sheepish grin on his face and he asked me if this was what I envisioned when we were talking about doing Lear in 2009.  I looked around the room, people were preparing themselves, smoke from the smudge bowl was filling the rehearsal hall and billowing down the halls of the NAC; forty smiling, laughing, beautiful, Aboriginal people gathered in a circle for one purpose: to tell one of the greatest stories ever told.

Was this what I envisioned?

“No Augie.” I said, “I couldn’t have imagined this in my wildest dreams.”

-Kevin Loring

National Arts Centre's productions of King Lear runs May 8 - 26, 2012.  For tickets call 1-888-991-2787 (ARTS) or click here.