White Girls in Moccasins

Yolanda Bonnell’s White Girls in Moccasins, presented by manidoons collective and Native Earth Performing Arts opened at the Aki Studio on Friday night.  Co-directed by Bonnell and Carmen Alvis, it’s a play about identity and and recovering roots.  The principal character Miskozi, like the playwright, is Indigenous but I don’t think the play is entirely about Indigenous identity.  The other two roles are Zlibi, played by a Bermudian Trans Woman of African ancestry and Waabishkizi; played by a second generation Settler woman.  So while the focus is on Indigenous identity I think it raises a lot of other questions too.

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Coming up in February

Here’s a few things to look forward to next month.  Weirdly everything I know about so far is in the first half of the month so I’ll maybe do a supplemental for the back half in a couple of weeks time. Continue reading

Born-Again Crow

There is Violence and There is Righteous Violence and There is Death or, The Born-Again Crow is perhaps the longest play title ever but the play itself, written by Caleigh Crow, is a fast moving ninety minutes.  It’s a collaboration between Native Earth Performing Arts and Buddies in Bad Times and it opened on Thursday night in a production directed by Jessica Carmichael.

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Women of the Fur Trade

Francis Končan’s Women of the Fur Trade opens tonight (Thursday) at the Aki Studio in a production by Native Earth Performing Arts.  I saw a preview last night.  It’s not an easy play to describe.  It’s a comedy.  But with several twists.  It has a historic setting.  But it plays fast and loose with time.  It’s funny, disturbing and relates events from a female point of view that rarely get seen that way.

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Canoe

Canoe; libretto by Spy Dénommé-Welch, music by the librettist and Catherine Magowan, had its world premier at Trinity St. Paul’s on Friday evening.  It’s a complex work and adopts some interesting approaches to telling an Indigenous story within the conventions of European opera.  It’s effectively directed, on quite a minimal but functional set (Lindy Kinoshameg), by Dénommé-Spy and Moynan King.

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(L-R): “Gladys” Nicole Joy-Fraser, “Debaajimod” Michelle Lafferty, “Tree Spirit” Conlin Delbaere-Sawchuk, “Constance” Kristine Dandavino

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