Review: Where the Blood Mixes

(photo credit: Mateo Hernandez)

the bitter winter seeps in through the cracks
Teesri Duniya forces us to pay attention
by Jessica Wei

Canada's a fairly unassuming country. We're known for confusing politics, casual beers, icy temperatures and warm smiles. However, any true Canadian – especially anyone who lives in Quebec – knows, when it's hot, it's sweltering and when it's cold, it numbs to the bone. Some of our history is like that, too. We love our proud moments in history: the invention of insulin, the Battle of Vimy Ridge,  passing universal health care in '62, our tumultuous road to victory during the Summit Series in '72 against the Soviets, the entire Vancouver Olympics in '08 (including our tumultuous road to victory in Men's Hockey)... warm, friendly, glowing moments engraved on our currency, celebrated in our newspapers on anniversary years, boasted in our textbooks. 

But the bitter winter seeps in through the cracks. Those are times we just don't comment on the weather. If you have nothing nice to say, don't say anything at all, and most of us just don't say anything at all. 

Review: State of Denial

Docu...Drama

Rahul Varma confronts the big issues again

by Chris Lane

Denial comes in many forms, and can effectively erase the memories of the oppressed victims of atrocities untold. Local playwright Rahul Varma seeks to uncover the personal stories that have been suppressed and present them in a stark and moving new play, State of Denial. The production is presented by Teesri Duniya, of which Varma is Artistic Director, a theatre company with a 31-year history of  politically relevant plays that depict diverse aspects of Canada’s cultural minorities. 

In writing this play, Varma derived a fictional story from multiple true stories garnered from years of interviews as a part of the research for Life Stories of Montrealers Displaced by Genocide, War and Other Human Rights Violations. State of Denial is being presented as a part of Life Stories Montreal and is directed by Deborah Forde.

The Sunday Read: First-Person - Rahul Varma on State of Denial

State of Denial: In memories of grandmothers who lived to tell 

© Rahul Varma, March 11, 2012

State of Denial is about Sahana, a Turkish Muslim woman in her nineties, who has devoted her life to assisting Armenian survivors of genocide, and about Odette, a twenty something Rwanda-born Canadian filmmaker, who travels to Turkey to investigate stories of genocide. These two women differ in their nationality, ethnicity, religion, cultural background and age – but they have one thing in common: A well-kept personal secret, which if uncovered, will change their life forever. Initially, the two women are suspicious of each other. They question and quiz, comply and compete, and challenge and contradict each other – and in so doing, they become the best of friends. On her deathbed, Sahana reveals her chilling secret to Odette and Odette promises to make Sahana’s secret public at any cost. On her mission to make public Sahana’s secret, Odette ends up revealing her own. With that a denial ends and a new life begins. 

Review: The Poster

Jade Hassouné in The Poster

(photo: ADARNA Photography)

The Dangerous Subject of Palestine

No matter what you say...someone will be pissed off

by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

Like abortion or capital punishment, Middle-East politics, specifically those surrounding Palestine, is a subject you do not discuss lightly. Simply, there are tempers ready to explode on both sides of the issue and a playwright needs to wade into these waters eyes-open, aware of the mines everywhere.

Review: Encounter

Sindhoor (l) and Natyaveda in a thrilling pas de deux

The River Theatre
I have never seen anything quite like Aparna Sindoor's company.
by Gaëtan L. Charlebois


There are certain works of art you must allow to wash over you. I am reading Proust's gigantic Remembrance of Things Past and it is one of those works. Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass is another. Tonight I saw Encounter, a Teesri Duniya producion, imported from India to help the company celebrate its 30 years and it is definitely one of those works. It is a play filled with dance but as if to underline the fact the moments will be allowed to breathe, actual breath is part of the soundscape of the initial images. The subsequent images, sounds and movements wash over you, if you allow them to.

To say this was an evening of exotica, for me, would sound faintly racist. But the fact is that I (and I suspect most in the house and many readers who should rush to see the short run of the piece) have never seen anything quite like Aparna Sindoor's company, Navarasa Dance Theatre, in action. There is not only a fusing of dance and theatre, here, but even within the different arts an explosive fusion of cultures. The dance is definitely rooted in the traditional, but they have incorporated into the movement elements from occidental modern dance (there is a stunning pas de deux that would be at home with Alvin Ailey's company) and even more eclectic suggestions than that: I couldn't help thinking, at one point, of the propagandist ballet/operas of Mainland China like the iconic Red Headed Girl - fascism as art.

The Upstage Interview: Aparna Sindhoor

More than gods and godesses

When I want to create my own work I need to tell the stories that make me feel, think, bother me, make me cry.

Upstage Host Eric Sukhu spoke with Aparna Sindhoor founder of Navarasa Dance Theatre. Encounter will be presented by Teesri Duniya Theatre as part of their 30th anniversary celebrations.

Below is an abridged version of the interview, edited by Estelle Rosen.    

UPSTAGE

You tackle a lot of social issues in Encounter. How did the creation of this piece come about.

SINDHOOR

Encounter is our latest production.  The original piece was created last year in Boston. It is composed of several encounters including Divine, gravity, Bob Marley, and military. The military encounter is what we’ll be presenting in Montreal. The story is based on a short story by Indian writer Mahasweta Devi. It is about an indigeneous woman and her resistance and defiance against injustice in her community.