Theatre heads to Prague

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De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre Group is touring Prague, Czech Republic this month as part of a creative collaboration with the drama department at the University of Toronto and Prague's Studio Ysilon Theatre.

The Prague-Toronto-Manitoulin Island Theatre Project (PTMTP) is spreading its message of cultural understanding through the performance of two plays: A Trickster's Tale by Tomson Highway and Myths That Unite Us, an original piece created and produced by all the participants of PTMTP.

"It's a total of 40 performers in that show and they've been exploring myths from their own culture and looking at where different kinds of myths cross over into different cultures. So that project will have some Ojibway, English and Czechoslovakian in it. Some of the students don't speak the other languages so we'll be relying on our own bridge building skills to build those relationships," Ron Berti, artistic director of the De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre Group, told Birchbark at the end of April.

The message of cultural understanding will not be lost on the audience despite the language barriers. Berti said the fact that there are people from different cultural backgrounds producing and performing speaks louder than words.

"It's a show about (how) these people, even though they don't speak the same language, can work, create and perform together. And our work always includes a lot of humour in it, and a lot of our humour is physical, so it goes beyond language," said Berti.

The De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre Group became involved with the project last March.

As the artist-in-residence at the Art Gallery of Ontario, the work by the company caught the eyes of Michal Schonberg, a drama professor at U of T, and Jan Schmid, founder and artistic director of the Studio Ysilon Theatre.

Berti said the work at the gallery was meant to provide the mainstream audience with "an understanding of the Anishnaabe world view." Its theme of "cross-cultural bridge-building" embodies the spirit of the project.

Aside from the excitement spending May 1 to 16 in Europe, Berti said that the actors of the De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre Group looked forward to seeing how the creative process takes place in other theatre companies.

"I think they're very fascinated by the idea of working with the artists from Studio Ysilon. They have a very similar creation process as Debaj. We've developed our own creation process called the four directions creation process, which is basically a new way of creating work that is not necessarily text-based. It picks up on the abilities of people who are from an oral tradition, and we found out that Studio Ysilon has a very similar process. So we're interested in getting over there and finding out more details about how they are creating their works and what their process is like so we can share ideas on each other's creative process," said Berti.

The Prague tour is also an opportunity to showcase the diversity of Aboriginal theatre in Canada. Not only is the Native art scene alive and well, Berti said that it is nothing like what mainstream audiences expect because the theatre company continues to deconstruct stereotypes of Aboriginal people and culture through its productions.

"Because the expectation continues to be, as you probably realize, that there would be not just feathers and dancing and you know, a very narrow concept of what contemporary Aboriginal theatre may be.

"So I think with A Trickster Tale and with our participation in the other work, we'll be able to open some eyes to see that, first of all, there are many Aboriginal cultures in Canada, not just one, and that we have a whole wide range of interpretations of way of working (and) of styles," he said.