Underground Railway Theater’s production of Sila will be showing at the Central Square Theater in Cambridge starting April 24, 2014. Playwright Chantal Bilodeau and director Megan Sandberg-Zakian merge Inuit myth with contemporary Arctic policy to use stories of personal significance to show the impact of global warming and climate change. Set on Baffin Island in the Nunavut territory of the Canadian Arctic, Sila chronicles eight characters- including an Inuit activist and her daughter, a climatologist, two polar bears, and an Inuit elder- as they struggle with maintaining their values in a rapidly changing environment. Three languages (English, French, and Inukitut), puppetry, spoken word poetry, projections, and a talented acting ensemble all work together to illustrate the contending forces that are shaping the future of the Canadian Arctic and local Inuit population.
Leading actress Reneltta Arluk (Inuvialuit, Gwich’in and Chipewyan-Cree) plays the role of Leanna- who is inspired by real life Inuit climate change activist Sheila Watt Cloutier. Arluk is an actress, playwright, author, artistic director, and poet from the Northwest Territories. After traveling extensively throughout Canada and the U.S., Arluk was the first Aboriginal woman to graduate with a BFA in acting from the University of Alberta in 2005. Since then she has been involved in the founding, writing, and production of numerous plays, films, and events. In 2008, Arluk founded Akpik Theatre in Yellow Knife to present, develop, and produce northern Indigenous stories. In an interview for Canada’s Arctic Journal “Above and Beyond” Arluk reflected on what led her to seek indigenous stories and bring them to the theater, “For the first time, I realized that culture can die,” says Arluk. “And that’s when my Peoples stories started to become really important to me.”Arluk will be performing some of her poetry at the Spoken Word Poetry event Tuesday, May 6 at 7pm at Central Square Theater.
Debra Wise, the artistic director of Underground Railway Theater, was a participant in a collaborative project between playwrights and MIT physicist called Science on Stage. According to Wise, the projects purpose was not only to entertain but also, “to follow these [productions] with conversations that put audiences in direct engagement with scientists who were doing cutting-edge work in the scientific areas that were being explored.” The project has evolved into Catalyst Collaborative; a collaborative between MIT and two non-profit professional theater companies, Underground Railway Theater and Nora Theater Company. The collaborative brings together theater artists and scientist to produce plays that”… deepen public understanding of science and technology.”
Central Conversations, a series of open dialogues where audience members can participate in discussions with climate experts and community partners on issues central to Sila, will follow each performance.
Sila is winner of the Woodward International Playwriting Prize and will be running until May 25, 2014. Tickets and more information are available at http://www.centralsquaretheater.org/shows/sila/ .
For more information see:
https://www.arts.gov/NEARTS/2013no3-kind-of-beauty/finding-common-ground
http://arcticjournal.ca/a-season-of-cloudberries-with-reneltta-arluk/
