Indigenous students take centre stage to perform on the devastating effects of suicide

By Rick Garrick

TORONTO—Three Indigenous students from the Centre for Indigenous Theatre are creating a play about the devastating effects of suicide pacts for performance at the May 14-20 Paprika Festival in Toronto.

“We each come from very diverse backgrounds,” says Jesse Wabegijig, an actor from Wiikwemkoong and one of the three students. “The thing that drew us together was about suicide pacts and our own personal experiences of pain, trauma and death. From that point, we began brainstorming different ideas about plays and started testing scenes.”

The play, S.O.S. Saving Our Sovereignty, follows the story of a young urban Indigenous woman who grew up off the reserve, but her parents send her to live on the reserve to reconnect with her culture and to keep her out of trouble.

“It centres around the idea of sovereignty and Indigenous youth,” says Pesch Nepoose, another one of the three students and a Cree actor. “We follow an urban Indigenous teenager who is sent to live on the reserve by her parents and she meets two students named Billy and Diana.”

The three teenagers eventually begin playing a game called the Trauma Olympics, where they reveal long-held secrets.

Wabegijig and Nepoose along with Theresa Cutknife, the third student and a Cree-Puerto Rican actor, have been busy with writing, rehearsing and collaborating on the play since they pitched it to the Paprika Festival, where it will be performed from May 14-19.

“We knew we wanted to speak about Indigenous youth because we are youth,” Cutknife says. “We wanted a story that was different from other stories that we’ve heard that are just about all of our hurt, all of our pain, all of the horrible things that have happened to us because of colonization and residential schools. We wanted to show another side of that where there is more than just our hurt and how we can move forward from that.”

Wabegijig, Nepoose and Cutknife will be performing all of the roles in their play, including the acting and technical work.

“In the coming weeks, we will have a tech workshop,” Cutknife says. “They give us the knowledge of learning about that side of the theatre and how to work that into our own show.”

Yolanda Bonnell, facilitator of the Indigenous Arts Program at the Paprika Festival and a Fort William citizen, says part of her role is to help guide the three actors in terms of their storyline and what they are trying to say in their play.

“If they are stuck, if they are having writer’s bock, I can give them a writing exercise to do,” Bonnell says. “[I] remind them of deadlines, if they need space booked I can help them book spaces to rehearse in. I’m just mentoring them in terms of show creation so they are ready to present the piece by mid-May.”

Bonnell says it is important to engage Indigenous youth to create art that speaks to them so they can learn how to use their voice.

“We can start the process of healing if we start with our youth,” Bonnell says. “If we allow them the opportunity to use their voice to tell their stories, to speak their truths and feel empowered, they can start healing and once they can start healing, I think that will enable to help heal us all.”

The Paprika Festival is being held at the Aki Studio on the main floor of the Daniels Spectrum in Regent Park.