Lisa C. Ravensbergen gives a standout performance in God and the Indian
By Drew Hayden Taylor. Directed by Renae Morriseau. A Firehall Arts Centre production, in partnership with Native Earth Performing Arts. At the Firehall Arts Centre on Thursday, May 21. Continues until May 30
It’s important to talk about the Canadian Indian residential school system and the damage it caused. In the theatre, it’s important to explore that conversation with the level of artistry it deserves.
In Drew Hayden Taylor’s God and the Indian, a panhandler named Johnny follows Assistant Bishop George King back to his office when she spots him on the street one day, and accuses him of sexually abusing her when she was a 12-year-old student at the Anglican residential school where he taught. He denies it. The cycle of accusation and denial repeats for the next 80 minutes.
The script includes some affecting passages. In one of them, Johnny describes how her brother, Sammy, a fellow student, died of TB, and how the school destroyed the records of kids like him. Many mothers, Johnny says, have stretch marks from children who, according to the authorities, have never been born.
Johnny’s descriptions of her alcoholism, failed relationships, and life on the street speak to pain that goes deep in Canada.
The script’s faulty structure undermines it, however. In John Patrick Shanley’s Doubt, which deals with possible sexual abuse in a Catholic school, revelations and shifts in sympathy are so sudden and dramatic that they produce gasps in the audience. Watching God and the Indian, on the other hand, I felt my sympathies shift only slightly and sluggishly, and, without giving anything away, two of the moments that are meant to look like shifts are mere gimmicks. So, mostly, we’re left with the numbing repetition of “You did it,” “No I didn’t.” At one point, King asks, “Johnny, how long are we going to sit here, staring at one another, making accusations and small talk?” Exactly.
All of this said, Lisa C. Ravensbergen’s performance as Johnny is nothing short of stellar. From the moment Johnny enters, with her contorted gait and challenging eyes, you just know the actor is channelling something powerful. She’s inspired. She’s in a groove. And there are lots of colours in this performance. Ravensbergen delivers playwright Taylor’s trademark quips with gleeful mischief, punctuating them by grinning and sticking out her tongue. She found out that Jesus was Jewish, she says. “Now I always picture him as that Seinfeld guy.”
Thomas Hauff delivers a sincere portrait as King, but, under Renae Morriseau’s direction, his performance sometimes tips over into the self-conscious volume of forced theatrics.
Ravensbergen’s work as Johnny is so wonderful that one can’t help but wish that Taylor had given both the actor and the character a more dynamic and satisfying vehicle.
Comments
1 Comments
Judith
May 23, 2015 at 11:48am
This play was outstanding. It was clever, fast-paced and meaningful - Lisa C. Ravensbergen offered a spellbinding character whose poignant humour and brilliant sarcasm pierced the heart of anyone who had one.
Some of us who have worked with First Nations women in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside - fittingly, the locale of Firehall Theatre - recognize the sad physical wounds that Ravensbergen carried as being far too familiar. They lent full legitimacy to "Johnny's" identity.
Ravensbergen had superb material in Playwright Drew Hayden Taylor's work, and clearly Renae Morriseau's tight direction, discreet background graphics and lighting, along with the able support of co-star Thomas Hauff, allowed the audience to focus fully on the dialogue between "Johnny" and the "Assistant Bishop."
It was a bit perturbing when some of us in the audience laughed inappropriately. With seemingly few First Nations members present among us, we middle-class white people were sometimes very far off in comprehending the dark pain behind some of the seemingly flippant lines.
It is to be hoped that new understanding of the subtlety in communications that 'God and the Indian' demonstrated in the seemingly offhand remarks of "Johnny" will carry forward into the dominant culture.
This production should be enjoyed more than once. Comprehending the impact of First Nations' transitions through Canadian history and society will require careful listening and much subsequent mulling.
Yet a single performance did not leave us feeling shortchanged.
This play demonstrates the complex and subtle layers of trauma that reverberate across our nation, to which we have largely been deaf.