The Unnatural and Accidental Women

I See You Sisters Like Yesterday Today: The Unnatural and Accidental Women

Sharon Sullivan is an Associate Professor of In “Archimedes and the Paradox of Theater and Chair of Women’s and Gender Feminist Criticism,” Myra Jehlen writes that Studies at Washburn University, Topeka, “feminist thinking is really rethinking, an Kansas. She is particularly interested in the examination of the way certain assumptions intersections between art and activism. Her about women and the female character enter current research interests focus on modern into the fundamental assumptions that or- slavery, domestic violence, and incarcerated ganize all our thinking” (Jehlen 1981, 89). women. Métis playwright Marie Clements examines and challenges assumptions about gender Abstract and indigeneity in her play, The Unnatural This paper argues that Marie Clements’ play, and Accidental Women (UAW). Based on a The Unnatural and Accidental Women, pro- true story of a man who killed at least ten motes a (re)creation of a women’s community indigenous women in Vancouver, British that empowers women and nurtures indi- Columbia (B.C.), by poisoning them with alco- vidual identity. Inspired by the true story of hol, Clements recreates/rethinks the events women murdered by a serial killer in Van- from the victims’ points of view. Ultimately, couver, British Columbia, Clements focuses she reveals not only what has been rendered on the indigenous women victims whose stor- invisible about the women’s lives, but also the ies were not told in the media. possibility of a different cultural reality based on both inclusivity and respect for difference. Résumé Marie Clements has been a perform- Cet article soutient que la pièce de Marie er, playwright, director, and artistic director in Clements, The Unnatural and Accidental theatres across B.C. and parts of the United Women, fait la promotion d’une (ré)création States. As a playwright, Clements’ plays have d’une communauté féminine qui responsabi- been staged nationally and internationally, lise les femmes et encourage l’identité indi- including at Ottawa’s National Arts Centre, viduelle. Inspirée par l’histoire vraie de L.A.’s Mark Taper Forum, Minneapolis’s Play- femmes assassinées par un tueur en série à wright’s Center, the International Festival of Vancouver, en Colombie-Britannique, Clem- Native Playwrights in Illinois and New York, ents porte son attention sur les femmes vic- The Literature Festival in Germany, and the times autochtones, dont les histoires n’ont Women, Text and Technologies Festival in pas été rapportées par les médias. Leeds, England. The Unnatural and Acci- dental Women premiered at the Firehall Arts Centre in November 2000. Clements wrote the screenplay for a film version of the play, which was produced in 2006. As a writer, director, and producer through her company, Working Pajama Lab, Clements is currently developing several film projects. The accounts of serial killer Gilbert Paul Jordan, “a man who has been named in the news media as one of [Canada’s] deadli- est predators,” inspired UAW (Hopkins 2000, 7). The Canadian mainstream media narrative told Jordan’s story while the victims re- mained, for the most part, nameless, face-

www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 65 less, and without history (Rose, Pemberton, Rose and Aunt Shadie are the oldest women and Sarti 1987); they were simply cast as in the play and the first two women murdered victims, alcoholics, and prostitutes. Clements’ (in 1965 and 1978 respectively). The final two play refocuses this story onto the women. By characters are white men: Jordan, the Bar- naming these women (although not using Jor- ber, in his 30s and 60s, “short, balding, nice dan’s victims’ real names), Clements honours and creepy” and a man who abuses and them as individuals with aspirations, histories, murders women; and Ron, a handsome cop and families—something denied to them in “with a nice body and a good sense of the news and coroners’ reports. humour” who becomes Rebecca’s lover (Clements 2005, 6). The actor playing Jordan Plot and Structure also “transforms” into The Man, The Roman- Clements intertwines three separate tic Partner, The Pillow, The Dresser, The storylines in the play: the stories of the mur- Man’s Shadow, The Airline Steward, and 2nd der victims; interactions between indigenous Fatherly Male Voice (Clements 2005, 6). Ron and white women, represented by encounters is the logger and is referred to as “It” until he through an old-fashioned hotel switchboard; is named Ron (Clements 2005, 6). and the story of the protagonist, Rebecca, UAW uses surrealism and multiple who is looking for her indigenous mother, Rita narrators to normalize events in a way that Louise James (also known as Aunt Shadie), accentuates the horror of the murders. Clem- who she has not seen for twenty years. Ten ents describes the atmosphere of the fictive characters are women murdered by Jordan world in the stage directions: (also known as “the Barber”) during the play. Nine of these women are indigenous women Scenes involving the women should have the feel living on, what Clements terms, “skid row”: of a black and white picture that is animated by the Aunt Shadie, age 52, described as having bleeding-in of colour as the scene and their im- “mother qualities of strength, humour, love, aginations unfold. Colours of personality and spirit, patience”; Mavis, age 42, “a little slow from life and isolation paint their reality and activate the the butt down, but stubborn in life and mem- particular landscape within each woman’s own ory”; The Woman (later named Brenda), age particular hotel room and world. Their deaths are a 27, who “looks and moves like a deer”; drowning-down of hopes, despairs, wishes. The Valerie, age 33, “a big beautiful woman proud killer is a manipulative embodiment of their human of her parts”; Verna, age 38, “sarcastic but need. Levels, rooms, views, perspectives, shadow, searching to do the right thing, the right way”; light, voices, memories, desires. (Clements 2005, Violet, ages 5 and 27, “an old spirit who 7) grows younger to see herself again”; and The Barbershop Women, a “ beautiful, sexy three- The surrealistic setting allows Clem- some that can move and sing,” consisting of ents to portray the isolation of the characters Marilyn, age 25, Penny, age 30, and Patsy, and their desire for human connection and age 40. The tenth woman is a white English affection. The women’s lives are bleak and immigrant, Rose, age 52, a switchboard oper- without colour, but they are unique individuals ator with “a soft heart, but thorny” (Clements yearning to love and be loved. 2005, 5–6). Clements portrays the women as Each scene begins with slides and isolated and alone before the murders. Their sound effects. The slides announce the title, need for comfort and love leaves them vul- date, and location of each scene. They also nerable to the deceptions of the Barber. introduce each woman after her murder Rebecca is the daughter of an indigenous through short newspaper notes describing the woman and a white logger. Her mother, autopsy results: “Marilyn Wiles, 40. Died called Aunt Shadie throughout the play, left December 04, 1984 with a 0.51 blood-alcohol their home because she was afraid her reading. An inquiry at the time concluded daughter would adopt the racist and sexist Wile’s death was ‘unnatural and accidental’” attitudes of Rebecca’s father that rendered (Clements 2005, 58). At first, sound is used to the mother invisible (Clements 2005, 82). metaphorically connect the women with na-

66 www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 ture and the destruction of nature. For Act II takes place in the fictive pres- example, Aunt Shadie enters the world of the ent. The other women have been murdered play to the sound effect of “a tree opening up and their spirits hover around Rebecca and to a split. A loud crack—a haunting gasp for Jordan. In the spirit world, the women are not air that is suspended. The sustained sound of alone. They are reunited in a community of suspension as the tree teeters” (Clements women that is strong, spirited, and loving. 2005,9). A logger yells, “Timber.” Aunt Shadie They interact with one another and react to yells for Rebecca. Over the course of Act I, Rebecca’s search for love and her mother the sounds become more complex, combin- and to Jordan’s efforts to seduce vulnerable ing previous effects with new ones: the sound women. While Rebecca and Jordan do not of a chainsaw gradually becomes a harmon- see or consciously acknowledge the spirit ica; the sound of the tide transitions into women until the very end of the play, Clem- whispers. The screen projections function as ents shows the audience that Rebecca and scenery and help establish time as the play Jordan subconsciously hear and respond to moves through both psychic and geographic their words. Despite their invisibility, the spirit space. women are able to affect the physical world; Act I begins with an appalling image they knock off Jordan’s glasses and eventu- of Aunt Shadie—naked, bruised, and dead— ally help Rebecca kill Jordan by gathering getting up and gathering her things. Rebecca around him and slitting his throat when intertwines her story of her search for her Rebecca realizes he is the murderer. mother with the logging history of Vancouver, The play is remarkable, in part, be- and how it created “skid row,” where the log- cause of the balance between surrealism and gers spent their time drinking and nursing realism in depicting the internal and exter- their wounds. Clements describes the de- nal lives of the characters. The stylistic mix velopment of “skid row” as a repercussion of heightens Clements’ critique of the effects of logging: both patriarchy and systemic racism. Within an episodic structure, the scenes move in a Everything here has been falling—a hundred years non-linear fashion, fragmenting time to create of trees have fallen from the sky’s grace. They laid an ambiguous, mystical environment where on their backs trying to catch their breath as the all the experiences of the characters exist in loggers connected them to anything that could the same moment. In this manner, Clements move, and moved them, creating a long muddy frees the women from possible blame for their path where the ends of the trees scraped the own murders, by re/claiming and declaring an ground, whispering their last connection to the autonomous, independent identity that rejects earth. This whispering left a skid. A skid mark. A the anonymity presented in the media de- row. Skid Row. (Clements 2005, 10) piction of the murders. The media described the women as prostitutes and alcoholics, but, Scenes of Aunt Shadie and white in imagining the women’s stories, Clements British switchboard operator Rose developing creates rich individuals that are complex and a friendship are intercut with scenes of the likeable, women who refuse to remain silent women’s isolation before their murders and and passive. with enactments of Jordan enticing them into Clements understands that some hor- his shop to kill them. Time is ambiguous, rors, like these murders, can never be accur- moving between memory, imagination, and ately represented. Her depiction of the mur- the spirit world to create a dreamlike ambi- ders corresponds to James Phelan’s notion of ance where anything can happen. Inanimate “the stubborn”: unlike “the difficult,” which is objects become animated, both threatening “recalcitrance that yields to our explanatory and comforting to the women characters. In efforts,” the stubborn is “recalcitrance that will addition to these images, the script uses not yield” (Phelan 1993, 714). Phelan recom- song, video, text, monologue, and dialogue to mends focusing not on “explicating” the stub- establish the inner lives of the women as well born, but rather on “explaining the purpose of as the outside world. its recalcitrance” (Phelan 1993, 715). Such a

www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 67 shift, Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan observes, “de- falling on the male loggers, maiming some mands that we recognize the impossibility of and killing others. In “Embodied Geog- mastering such an emotionally wrenching ex- raphies,” Anne Raine, referring to the art of perience” (1996, 119). Instead of trying to Ana Mendieta, notes that “the non-human master the experience by realistically por- material world is neither mere ‘background’ traying the homicides, Clements subverts the nor a ‘subjective earth’” and asks critical emotional connection of the spectator by questions about “the relationships between sabotaging any glorification of or gratification human subjects, individually and collectively, from the slayings by refusing to represent and something I have been calling whatever them realistically. For example, in the begin- else there is: the maternal body, the im- ning, Jordan cuts off the women’s braided aginary self, social and cultural Others, hair to symbolize their deaths and keeps the landscape and ‘nature,’ the Real” (Raine braids in his drawer as trophies. Gradually, 1999, 261). Rebecca’s story about logging though, the murder scenes become more describes and symbolizes a complex, socially stylized and briefer. Clements decentres the produced discourse of conquest that the act of murder by focusing on the experiences trees/nature and, eventually, the women, re- and actions of the women before and after sist. Their defiance offers the spectator an death, emphasizing their individuality and the entrance into the “whatever else there is” that possibility of redemption. has been obscured by the dominant narrative. Destruction and Resistance The loggers’ destruction of the trees UAW constructs a convergence of becomes a form of self-destruction, in that, history and narrative that is marked by gen- ultimately, the result of masculine violence is der, race, and colonialism. At the same time, men’s own death. At the beginning of the the play questions the idea of a singular real- play, Clements foreshadows the ending of the ity. The characters are positioned as (re)mak- play. The trees, alternately depicted as the ers of history, where their abusive pasts and men’s lovers and their enemies, foreshadow eventual murders motivate them to explore the spirits of the slain women as trappers/ strategies of empowerment and intervention. warriors who slay the murderer in order to Simply, they reject their assigned roles as save another woman and reclaim their com- passive victims and decide to stop Jordan munity. The trees do not prevent their own from killing other women. Clements refuses to death, but only slow down the loggers—no depict the women merely as victims; she matter how many are killed and maimed, gives them a voice. She offers an example of there is always another logger to take his “constructive” violence, one that upsets the place. In the same way, the female char- dominant media narrative and encourages a acters cannot save themselves, but only different paradigm for remembering and tell- prevent this one killer from murdering another ing the stories of the women. woman. There are other loggers/murderers The play begins with Rebecca telling who will continue the killing, but the women the story of logging in Canada. Using sound practise what Theresa de Lauretis terms and imagery, Clements connects the de- “micropolitical practice” or “local resistance.” struction of the trees with the destruction of “Micropolitical practice is that activity that women and indigenous peoples in the play. aims at understanding the margins, empow- The story echoes Dee Horne and other in- ering those who inhabit such margins to digenous writers in its critique of “settler represent themselves, and encouraging cri- values of progress and technology and settler tiques that account for the ways in which exploitation of the environment. Settler efforts ideology works first and foremost at home” to master/tame the environment, like their at- (quoted in Donkin and Clement 1993, 28). tempts to contain American Indians, women, According to Donkin and Clement, de Lau- and all people of color prove futile” (Horne retis promotes “a radicalization of agency on 1999, 40). At first, the trees are unresisting to the level of micropolitics,” rather than pre- the loggers’ efforts, but they later fight back, suming “an authority to know what’s best for

68 www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 the world.” Given that “differences between physical, valued for their flesh and the women are realized in specific contexts, or in pleasure women’s flesh can provide to the the ‘micropolitical practices of daily life,’” she masculine characters; this process denies maintains resistance must take place within them an individual identity. those contexts (Donkin and Clement 1993, Clements highlights the danger to 28). women living in patriarchal and colonial cul- Clements articulates a “micropolitical” tures when everyday objects become objects resistance that requires a personal, individual of pain and violence. For example, the hotel choice to participate in a community in order chest of drawers objectifies Valerie by focus- to create change. This articulation mirrors the ing on her breasts, making crude jokes about beliefs of many indigenous nations that a “knobs,” attempting to grab her breasts. member’s separation from the network of Eventually this escalates into a physical con- community life, and the discord that arises frontation (Clements 2005, 26–31). A giant from that disconnection, creates an unhealthy pillow is at first The Woman’s dancing part- condition for both the individual and the com- ner, but later rapes her (Clements 2005, 42, munity that can only be remedied through the 52). Mavis imagines an armchair is an old return of the alienated to the community boyfriend with his arms wrapped around her, (Moss 1993, 62–63). In the fictive world of but when she returns to the chair she finds it UAW, Clements charts a path to a new site occupied, not by the imaginary boyfriend, but where indigenous women are no longer char- by Jordan, who kills her (Clements 2005, 36, acterized in relation to colonial culture, but 56). The desires of these women are met with rather in relation to their own communities— disproportionate patriarchal and colonial indigenous women’s communities that prac- violence. In UAW, this tension culminates in tise ongoing resistance to sexism and racism. more violence. Clements creates a woman- As discussed in greater detail below, at the centred space in UAW that symbolizes the end of Act I, Aunt Shadie calls to the women necessity for a conceptual/paradigmatic vio- and they answer. “Aunt Shadie calls to them lence that challenges current conventional in song and they respond, in song, in rounds dichotomies of female victim and male of their original languages” (Clements 2005, assailant. The female characters are both vic- 58). The call and response grows “in strength tims and assailants; the male murderer is and intensity” until the end of the act, when murdered. “all their voices join force” (Clements 2005, Clements also suggests that the 58). The women characters define them- white woman, Rose, and the indigenous selves, foregoing colonial definitions, in order women experience similar desires and to restore/create an independent and collect- adversities. This theme also emerges when ive identity. Rebecca takes offense at Ron’s characteriza- tion of indigenous people on “skid row”: Violence and Desire Clements produces moments of dis- Since you ask, I don’t think so many of them end turbing contradiction and paradox in her de- up down there. I think so many people end up pictions of desire, abuse, and death. Rebecca down there. Period…It’s an accident. Something tells the logger she loves him, but he cannot heavy falls on them. It might just be one Thing… hear or understand her over the noise of his one thing and then everything seems to tumble chainsaw. In their quest for money, power, down and pretty soon there is no getting up…Like and violence, the male characters, who signi- an accident—people drive by in their nice cars and fy white, colonial, and patriarchal values and stare at people on those streets, because they the “masculine” animated objects, are not realize for a moment it could be them. So they seeking the connections valued by the might be saying “poor bastards,” but what they’re women in the play. Repeatedly, the women really thinking about is themselves and their own characters seek love, companionship, and potential tragedy. (Clements 2005, 98) comfort, but these desires make them vulnerable. They are consistently reduced to the

www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 69 Here Clements emphasizes human frailty. All AUNT SHADIE: White is a blindness. It has noth- people are vulnerable even though “nice ing to do with the colour of your skin. (Clements people” like to imagine it is “those” people, 2005, 82) “mentally ill or brown or addicted to one thing or another,” who are the only ones suscept- The white woman and the indigen- ible to loneliness and tragedy (Clements ous woman are able to “see” each other 2005, 98). through the revelation of their personal stories, even though they are different. “White” is Identity and Visibility never a description of a person’s colour or In UAW, Clements creates indigen- ethnicity, or lack of colour or ethnicity. “White” ous women’s identities different from the is coded, pointing to race as constructed ones depicted in the media and in patriarchal, rather than natural. In this moment, “white” is racist, colonial culture. She refrains from coded as racism. In “White Birds,” white is identifying any particular woman by her spe- “the flutter of hope” (Clements 2005, 36). In cific indigenous community affiliation, not to “Violet,” white represents “uppity,” an empow- ignore differences, but to express solidarity in ered female attitude (Clements 2005, 63). their shared status. Rebecca remarks: When the women are able to see each other, solidarity becomes a possibility. LeAnne That begs the question, what does an Indian seem Howe describes a similar incident at the like? Let me guess. You probably think that if an “Celebration of Native Women Playwrights” Indian goes to university or watches TV, it makes conference at Miami University in 1999. In the her the same as every other Canadian. Only less. discussion following the staged reading of The big melting pot. The only problem is you can’t Strength of Indian Women, several non- melt an Indian. You can’t kill a stone. You can indigenous women were upset and defensive grind it down to sand but it’s still there sifting because they had not known the history of through everything forever… (Clements 2005, 97) the residential schools. The non-indigenous women began to tell their stories of oppres- Clements presents a collective indigenous sion: women’s identity that allows the characters to join together to better resist the violent, racist, Others began to tell their stories: the Jewish patriarchal colonizer as represented by the Holocaust, of the horrors of slavery and what was character of Jordan. The women share the done to African Americans, the hardships that the experiences of sexism, violence, and colonial Italians and the Irish had faced at Ellis Island. oppression as well as a history of empowered What I believe was happening to the non-Indians communities. So, while emphasizing the was that they were threading their lives and experi- diversity of the individual women, Clements ences into ours. A shift in paradigm, it’s generally simultaneously designs a community that is believed to be the other way around: Indians as- stronger than any individual. similating into the mainstream. (Howe 1999, 124) Within the play, Clements offers a place for indigenous and non-indigenous Howe calls this “rhetorical space women to connect outside of the structures ‘tribalography,’” indigenous stories with “the that separate them. When Aunt Shadie con- power to transform…Indigenous storytelling is fesses her fear of being invisible, of being revealed as a living character who continues perceived by white people as if she is “not to influence our culture” (Howe 1999, 118). At worthy of being seen,” Rose simply replies, “I the beginning of the play, Rose and Aunt see you. And I like what I see.” Shadie are “in their own spaces and places. They are in their own world. Happy hunting AUNT SHADIE: I see you…and don’t worry you’re ground and/or heaven” (Clements 2005, 7). not white. Clements decreases the distance between white and indigenous women by showing ROSE: I’m pretty sure I’m white. I’m English. them to each other through the narrative, with respect and appreciation for their differences.

70 www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 Ultimately, it does not matter that the switch- Mavis asks, “The operator? I didn’t want any board is beautiful to Rose and gives Aunt operator. I dialed the numbers myself. I’m Shadie a headache; it does not matter wheth- more than capable of calling a long distance er they wear white gloves or rabbit mitts, number…What kind of house are you in because they both know the desire to con- where people call and you don’t help them?” nect and be visible (Clements 2005, 81). (Clements 2005, 22). At the same time, Rose, However, it is significant that Rose is a white seemingly unaware of the historical signifi- woman who is ready to listen to, communi- cance of her position as a white woman cate with, and care about the other charac- interfering in Mavis’s life, fails to understand ters. Mavis’s anger: “You don’t have to be rude. I was just trying to be helpful. I have a very Isolation and Connection demanding job and I don’t need this static Clements presents the different so- from you…” (Clements 2005, 32). Eventually, cial, racialized, and economic histories of the the conversation between Rose and Mavis women characters—poor indigenous women; disintegrates, generating a kind of poem or a white middle-class English woman; and a chant where they express similar feelings of young indigenous woman searching for her isolation, but do not hear or understand one mother. In presenting this diversity of back- another: grounds, she highlights the differences among the women and how these shape their ROSE: I’m just doing my job and that’s all you can complex interactions. ask out of anybody, just that a person do the job For example, Jordan murders Rose, they were meant to do and I try to do my job a the English switchboard operator, and the million times a day. indigenous women because they are all vulnerable, but their lived experiences make MAVIS: Like you know it all when you don’t know these characters vastly different from one an- me, and you don’t give a damn how I’m feeling or other. Aunt Shadie’s mother wore big rabbit what I’m worried about or why I can’t get off my mitts to combat the cold, while Rose’s mother ass and just leave my room. wore white gloves to be a “lady” (Clements 2005, 17). Rose and Mavis both want to con- ROSE: …a million times a day. nect with other people, electronically and emotionally, but they are placed at odds with MAVIS: I’m so scared I can’t move. one another by “the rules” governing a colonial and patriarchal society—what Clements ROSE: …a million times a day... describes as “management” (Clements 2005, 23). These differences affect relationships be- MAVIS: I can’t breathe. tween the female characters, especially along the lines of race. ROSE: I get this static a million times a day... In the scenes “I’m Scared To Die 1” and “I’m Scared To Die 2,” Mavis is alone in a MAVIS: I listen. cheap hotel room, looking through her ad- dress book, trying to find someone to phone. ROSE: …times a day… She attempts a call, which the switchboard operator, Rose, answers. Rose wants to help MAVIS: I cry. Mavis, wants to connect with her, but Mavis is very distrustful. Rose is also isolated: “Well, ROSE: …from the static of nothing. to be honest…no one’s ever reached me on the phone before, and I just don’t know if it’s MAVIS: a million times a day. house policy or not” (Clements 2005, 22). Mavis cannot understand Rose’s limitations ROSE: I want… and, despite her efforts, Rose cannot help her reach the friend Mavis is attempting to call. MAVIS: I reach out for it.

www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 71 ROSE: …and nothing. (Clements 2005, 34–35) Between each line, Clements shows us how the women were isolated. The The women are isolated from one an- Barbershop Women—Marilyn, Patsy, and other and their communities. They desperate- Penny—are the first to answer, stepping out ly want to connect with another person, to of mirrors, while the slide projections give belong, to be visible. In their desperation, their ages, dates of death, and blood-alcohol each misses the effort of the other to reach reading. They repeat, “Do I hear you sister out through the darkness of the telephone like yesterday today” (Clements 2005, 58). switchboard (Clements 2005, 35). Violet describes her death and equates drowning in alcohol with forced oral sex, Ritual and Redemption before joining the women (Clements 2005, While the effects of colonization/patri- 59). Brenda is shown already dead, lying flat archy had effectively isolated the women on her bed with “clothes up when they should characters prior to their deaths, the creation be down. No pillow” (Clements 2005, 60). of a survival ceremony that reflects their his- Verna follows a toy airplane down from the torical pasts empowers and restores them. fifth floor of the hotel with a man’s voice Lee Maracle describes a ceremony as “any- saying, “Can I get you a drink? Can I get you thing that brings people closer to themselves a drink?” following her with each step. With …The manner in which a person seeks the each repetition of the invitation—“Do I hear self is always based on the sacred right of you sister like yesterday today”—another choice” (Maracle 1996, 111). At the end of woman chooses to connect with the others Act I, Aunt Shadie calls the women together and add her voice to theirs. The ritual re- “in song and ritual as they gather their voice, establishes the women’s community of the language and selves” (Clements 2005, 58). In past in the present time. four languages, she repeatedly exhorts them, The murdered women have the op- “Do I hear you sister like yesterday today” portunity to redeem their pasts through “con- (Clements 2005, 58–62): structive” violence, killing the murderer and saving Rebecca. They give Rebecca the op- Aunt Shadie: Do I hear you sister like yesterday portunity to change her future, to establish a today different, non-violent relationship with a man. When Aunt Shadie and the murdered women The Women: Do I hear you sister like yesterday band together to kill Jordan and save Reb- today ecca, they disrupt the history of their “mun- Do I hear you sister like yesterday today dane” existence—they are alive within a Do I hear you sister like yesterday today transcendent moment in which they alter fu- Under water—under time ture possibilities. What is extraordinary about Do I hear you sister like yesterday today the murdered characters is not that they are Hear your words right next to mine victims of a serial killer, but that they create Do I hear you sister like yesterday today new historical selves by rejecting isolation You are not speaking and yet I touch your words and passivity. As a community, they devise a So the river says to me drink me feel better plan to turn Jordan, the hunter, into the Like the river must’ve said to you first hunted: Drink me—feel better There is no sadness just the war of a great thirst Rebecca braces herself. She takes the razor and Do I see you sisters like yesterday today is about to cut his throat. See you as if you were sitting right here next to me Under water—under the earth The Barber’s [Jordan’s] eyes suddenly blaze open. My body’s floating where all the days are the same He grabs her hand and they struggle with the Long and flowing like a river blade. The blade draws closer to her neck and is My root—my heart about to cut her open. My hair drifts behind me [English lyrics only] (Clements 2005, 58–65)

72 www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 Aunt Shadie emerges from the landscape as a tims as individuals with lives outside of their trapper. She stands behind Rebecca. She puts her victimization—encourage spectators to ques- hand over Rebecca’s hand and draws the knife tion what is hidden from view in the narratives closer to the Barber’s neck. He looks up and of these events. In this way, Clements asks panics and he sees Aunt Shadie and the women/ the audience to interrogate their percep- trappers behind her. Squirming, they slit his throat. tions of gender, racialization, indigeneity, and (Clements 2005, 126) class. The Unnatural and Accidental Individually, Rebecca cannot kill Jordan, but Women also demonstrates the importance of the collective is more powerful than the in- solidarity, alliance, and community. Clements dividual. When her mother and the other maintains the survival of women and indigen- women join Rebecca, they are able to ous peoples requires both knowledge/ prac- succeed. tice of traditional “Indigenous Ways” and the After Jordan’s death, the women are adoption of a worldview that challenges the rewarded with the return of their braids, sym- destructive forces of racism, sexism, and bolizing their return to the community and colonialism of all forms. In the (re)creation of spiritual health. Clements mixes images of an indigenous women’s community, and in the murdered women as contemporary killing the serial killer—the representation of women and historical trappers. The women those destructive influences—Clements of- exist in both the past and present moments; fers a compelling image of hope for a differ- when they kill Jordan, they are also re- ent culture—devoid of colonial and patriarchal enacting the historical killing of trapped influences—that respects women, the past, animals for food, for survival. The past and individuality, and difference. present merge in this moment in a ceremony of restoration to one another and to the com- References munity. Bhabha, H.K. The Location of Culture. Lon- In the final scene of the play, “The don, New York: Routledge, 1994. First Supper. Not To Be Confused With The Last Supper,” the women all sit down to- Clements, M. The Unnatural and Accidental gether to “a beautiful banquet à la the Last Woman. Vancouver: Talon Books, 2005. Supper” (Clements 2005, 126). Clements creates a space analogous to Homi Bhabha's Donkin, E. and S. Clement. Upstaging Big “third space” (Bhabha 1994, 38) and a “hybrid Daddy: Directing Theater as If Gender and moment of political change” that is “neither Race Matter. Ann Arbor: University of Mich- the One…nor the Other…but something else igan Press, 1993. besides, which contests the terms and territories of both” (Bhabha 1994, 28). In this Hopkins, Z.L. "Well-Written, Well-Performed narrative, the women’s survival compels them Tragic Tale," Raven's Eye. 4, no. 7 (Novem- to band together to defeat Jordan. Rose is ber 2000): 7. included in the community because she respects the indigenous women characters. Horne, D. Contemporary American Indian Writing: Unsettling Literature. New York: Conclusion Peter Lang, 1999. In The Unnatural and Accidental Women, Clements exhorts the spectator to Howe, L. "Tribalography: The Power of Native re-examine their own perceptions of truth. Stories," Journal of Dramatic Theory and This strategy works especially well for those Criticism, NAWPA Supplement. XIV.1 (1999): who are familiar with the historical criminal 117–26. case and the media representations of both the murderer and the murdered. However, in Jehlen, M. “Archimedes and the Paradox of the current age of highly publicized serial kill- Feminist Criticism,” Signs. Vol. 6, No. 4 (Sum- ers, the principles of the play—to show vic- mer 1981): 575–601

www.msvu.ca/atlantis ■□ 36.1, 2013 73 Maracle, L. I Am Woman: A Native Perspec- Mendieta,” Feminist Approaches to Theory tive on Sociology and Feminism, 2nd ed. Van- and Methodology: An Interdisciplinary Read- couver: Press Gang Publishers, 1996. er, E.S. Hesse-Biber, C. Gilmartin, and R. Lydenberg, eds. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, Moss, M. We've Been Here Before: Women pp. 259–286. in Creation Myths and Contemporary Litera- ture of the Native American Southwest. Mün- Rimmon-Kenan, S. "Narration, Doubt, Re- ster: Lit Verlag, 1993. trieval: Toni Morrison's Beloved," Narrative. 4.2.May (1996): 109–123. Phelan, J. "Toward a Rhetorical Reader-Re- sponse Criticism: The Difficult, the Stubborn Rose, C., K. Pemberton, and R. Sarti, “Death and the Ending of Beloved," Modern Fiction by Alcohol,” Vancouver Sun Special Report, Studies. 39.3.4 (1993): 709–728. October 22, 1987, A1, A10–A13.

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