FORESHADOWING By Colin MacLean

The Tempest is one of the most magical of Shakespeare’s plays.

And his last major work. There is spectacle, allegory, betrayal, revenge, and the importance of family. It’s a fable of art and creation and many purport to see in Prospero, the aging necromancer at the center of the play, the figure of Shakespeare himself. In the bittersweet ending, Prospero renounces his magic. Is he perhaps the Bard saying goodbye to his art and, short years later, his life?

Since it was penned in 1610, it has proven to be surprisingly elastic. It has been subject to all sorts of interpretations (Is Caliban really the result of years of the white man’s colonial conquest of Africa?). It’s been an opera, a ballet, featured in paintings and a lot of movies (Forbidden Planet/Disney’s Pocahontas).

But few promise quite as much as the Citadel’s final production of the season, coming up in April.

First, let’s meet Josette Bushell-Mingo. She is a London-born, Swedish-based, actress, playwright, and director of African Descent. She has played in Peer Gynt and Antony and Cleopatra. In 2000, she was nominated for a Lawrence Olivier Award for her role as Rafiki in The Lion King.

The Queen presented her with an OBE.

Having lived in Sweden for many years, she is the former Artistic Director for The Swedish National Deaf Theatre, Tyst Teater (Silent Theatre).

Mutual theatrical interests brought her in contact with Daryl Cloran, the Citadel’s current Artistic Director. “Daryl is particularly interested in inclusive work – in new forms of communication, great theatre. He came to visit me in Sweden and that’s how we began our relationship.” Much discussion followed and finally Daryl made the decision to go with The Tempest.

So, as of the writing of this in early March, Bushell-Mingo finds herself with 16 participants in the Citadel/Banff Centre Professional Theatre Program spending a month amidst the glories of the Rocky Mountains preparing for a highly original interpretation of a 409-yearold play. The production will feature Deaf and hearing actors performing together on stage. It will NOT be the traditional view of the pairing, with hearing actors declaiming the Bard centre stage while Deaf performers “sign” in the corners. As the director told Foreshadowing in a written interview, “The two languages are different and we celebrate that – they must work in tension with each other, which gives a different urgency. The performers are working toward a complex translation, dialogue, and visual aspect inspired by the demands of Deaf culture – extremely physical and visual.”

“It will be a very physical show, dance-based and movement heavy,” promises Cloran.

Sign has long been accepted as a true language in itself with its own grammar and lexicon. Bushell-Mingo: “(I think that for audiences the combination of expression...) enhances the response to Shakespeare to create a visual and poetic experience. Sign language does something that spoken Shakespeare cannot do – in imagination, emotional depth, and cerebral reaction.”

In her production, Prospero will be played by Lorne Cardinal, an Indigenous actor best known for portraying Davis Quinton on TV’s Corner Gas. Cardinal is a trained classical actor and has enjoyed a distinguished career in movies, television, and stage.

There was a deer looking for something green to nibble in the snowy field in front of one of the exterior buildings at the Banff Centre when we talked on the telephone in early March. He was there for some exploratory work with the cast before they tackled the play itself.

He recalls a preliminary phone call from Cloran on the possibility of a role at the Citadel. “I was looking for Sam Sheppard – Eugene O’Neill or possibly Richard 3rd. You know, plays that have interesting, complex characters. He called back offering Prospero.” Cloran set up an interview with Josette. “I told her I was not interested in an old guy walking around with a stick. She offered a Deaf/hearing collaboration – and water, magic, revenge, physical theatre and a big friggin’ ship on stage. Her passion, clarity, straight forwardness, insights, and power were infectious. After five minutes, I knew I had to work with her.”

The thought of playing Shakespeare held no fear for the accomplished performer. In 2012, he was a player (and translator) for an all-Indigenous cast production of King Lear at the National Arts Centre. That Lear was set in the 17th century in Northern Ontario and consequently many words like “knight” and “castle” had to be replaced. Cardinal participated in the re-write of the Bard. “I had to get those images out of my mind and think in terms of canoes, wigwams, and forests.” There was a beneficial side effect: “We all just picked up on the original rhythms and adapted them to Cree. In fact, many of the actors who did the best work were people who didn’t have any Shakespearean training at all.” An experience that might have a positive effect in his current production. Bushell-Mingo was delighted at the casting. “He’s an extremely open actor who brings his identity with him. It will be his choice of whether he will use his aboriginal background in the role.”

Cardinal is in the midst of a steep learning curve. He is studying sign language. Throughout the rehearsals with Deaf actors, he discovered he has a shared common experience. Cardinal’s father and mother were both products of the Residential School system – as was the actor himself for two unhappy years. The experience fostered a life-long feeling of being “other” – an outsider. He learned that many Deaf people have suffered a similar experience – shunned because of what many considered a “disability.” “The process is complicated and exciting,” says Bushell-Mingo. “First to

understand and respect each other’s language and cultures and the other cultures in the room. Having to learn the value and structure of sign language – remember Deaf artists are used to communicating with us. We, as hearing people, have little or no opportunity to interact with the community.”

Cloran’s promise of a physical production also brought its own demands to the preproduction work. Techniques included such movement based disciplines as Suzuki, Laban, and Clown. Actually, Cardinal confided that he began his career as a clown. The Cree actor was born in Sucker Creek First Nation on the shore of Lesser Slave Lake but he fell in love with theatre while attending Cariboo College in 1987. Which means that the actor we will see as an elderly Renaissance magician made his first stage performance as a kid with a red nose.

The starting point for Bushell-Mingo are the words, “What if?” “I like the idea of the environment fighting back – oceans, seas, the earth to which Prospero’s revenge is connected. We don’t go far enough with Caliban. I want audiences to understand what it means for Caliban – the only black person on the island.” Ariel, in various iterations, will be played by seven actors. There will be interpolations from other Shakespearean plays.

The boundaries of this production extend far beyond just the marriage of two forms of language to probe deep into our cultural understanding of how theatre can be presented. Miranda, Prospero’s lovely daughter, is usually seen as kind, compassionate, and completely obedient to her father’s wishes. And usually as pale as an English spring snow crocus. In this production, this lovely “pinnacle of femininity” will be played by the lovely Thurga Kanagasekarampillai, a veteran of a number of Deaf and hearing productions and a one-woman United Nations who proudly defines herself as a “Deaf Sri Lankan Tamil Canadian Queer artist.”

And, instead of piling her unique vision all on top of the original and coming up with some four-hour behemoth, Bushell-Mingo has stripped the production down to a spare 90 minutes.

The artful director throws out a challenge to take on her “mosaic of ideas.” “People who don’t know the play should come and see it.” Will purists be horrified? “Who are these purists? Great work allows itself to transform and grow and transform again – but its heart always remains. But how it is done can set an audience’s imagination afire – that is the trick, the joy – the possibilities. Revenge, magic, justice, and love. Sounds like regular Shakespeare to me. The demand on the audience is to open up and join us on a unique journey in the epic retelling of one of Shakespeare’s greatest classics.”

The Tempest begins April 20 on the Shoctor stage and runs through May 12.