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PR: Clements’ Tombs January 5, 2011

Still Here, Native Earth Performing Arts’ season catchphrase rings more true than ever with upcoming world premiere of Marie Clements’ Tombs of the Vanishing Indian, co-produced with the award-winning red diva projects.  Prompted by a visit to a museum where statistics show that 90% of guests visit to see a people that “no longer existed”, Tombs of the Vanishing Indian is Marie Clements’ groundbreaking response, proof positive that Aboriginal people are indeed, still here.

Clements fluently tells the immense story of contact through a deeply personal account of the lives of three sisters.  While each sister essentially raises herself despite the effects of separation, adoption, and dislocation, Clements exposes a history of relocation, removal and vanishing, while artfully weaving in the hopes of new beginnings.

Originally commissioned by and developed with Native Voices at the Autry, Clements’ rich text delves into the poetic, characters seamlessly moving between English and Gabrielino, between the 19th and 20th centuries, all sharing in one story, in one reality.

Tombs of the Vanishing Indian gathers a community of Aboriginal artists from Canada and the United States, including two-time Gemini Award winner Michelle St. John, composer Jennifer Kreisberg (Ulali), Gabrielino/ Tongva consultant Virginia Carmelo and Native Earth’s own outgoing artistic director Yvette Nolan as director.  “I believe Marie Clements is the most important Aboriginal playwright working today, and I am thrilled to be able to collaborate with her once again,” Nolan says.  “I began my time here at Native Earth directing her epic play The Unnatural and Accidental Women, and it’s gratifying to be able to close my tenure with the premiere of Tombs of the Vanishing Indian.”

PLEASE ADD TO LISTINGS:

Native Earth Performing Arts and red diva projects present

Tombs of the Vanishing Indian

By Marie Clements
Directed by Yvette Nolan
With Keith Barker, Falen Johnson, Nicole Joy-Fraser, Martin Julien, PJ Prudat, Michelle St. John and David Storch

March 9-27, 2011
Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
12 Alexander St.
Toronto, Ontario

Tickets: $25, PWYC Fridays & Sundays
To purchase: 416.975.8555 or www.totix.ca
www.nativeearth.ca

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