Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, Thou Art Here Theatre. Photo by Mat Simpson

By Liz NIcholls, 12thnight.ca

On a sunny afternoon in the Edmonton river valley, the old Fort looks positively benign. And when we gather in the courtyard for a performance of Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, happy endings, love stories, alliances, the reconciliation of opposing forces … all seem possible.

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It the inspiration of Anishinaabe playwright (and storyteller and producer) Josh Languedoc and his co-creator Neil Kuefler to take us to the evening of September 9, 1876. Civil Blood reimagines the high-test moment and the lead-up to the signing of Treaty 6, which pertains to the land on which we live. And, like the Indigenous and settler characters of Kuefler and Mark Vetch’s Thou Art Here Theatre production, we are divided. We have to choose between two different narratives and their perspectives, intertwined but separate, through Languedoc’s ambitious double-routed play.

Maria Buffalo in Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, Thou Art Here Theatre. Photo by Mat Simpson
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You can follow the Indigenous-led track of Nehiyaw huntress Ekah (Emily Berard), or you can follow Lily (Christina Nguyen), a Euro idealist recently arrived in the West and discovering for herself its complex realities. I picked the former track, and (not coincidentally) we were led just outside the Fort. We arrived at a teepee with a welcoming white-clad Indigenous figure Takah (Maria Buffalo). In a production clad in earth-tones, there she was, in dazzling white, with a white feather in her hair. Was she a benevolent ghost from the ancestral world present on behalf of the continuity principle? A stalwart angel? A dream spirit? I’m not too sure. But she shepherded us through a variety of locations, and watched us watching.

There’s tension in the Indigenous camp, where privations — the settler incursions on traditional hunting lands, the disappearance of the buffalo, whiskey, disease — are taking their toll. The chief (Dylan Thomas-Bouchier) and his sister Ekah (Berard) are deeply distrustful of the olive branch extended by Governor Sampson, in the form of a peace treaty, with a dinner and dance to gild the lily. Are generosity and charity any substitute for equality? The Indigenous track of Civil Blood says no. The chief’s exuberant mama (Rebecca Bissonnette) is more conciliatory, and open to collaboration. Or maybe she’s just practical, given the dark undercurrent that the resistance to signing the treaty will, in the end, be futile anyway against mighty colonial power.

The ominous title of the piece is borrowed from the prologue to Romeo and Juliet (“civil blood makes civil hands unclean”), which sets forth the “ancient grudge” and “new mutiny” of that brouhaha in Verona. And from the tensions of Civil Blood, a Romeo and Juliet love story of star-cross’d lovers emerges: Ekah and Julian (Gabriel Richardson), a French-speaking philosophy scholar, are separated by the great colonial divide. And the arrival of Lily, the daughter of Governor Sampson (Doug Mertz), intrigued by this new adventure (and by Julian) complicates the love story still further.

It’s a volatile world they live in. And Berard and Richardson, both excellent, have a fine-tuned scene in which he attempts to rekindle their smouldering relationship, overcoming her wariness with his ardour.

Ivy DeGagné, Colby Stockdale, Emily Berard in Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, Thou Art Here Theatre. Photo by Mat Simpson

Julian’s vivacious and curious little sister Pauline (delightfully played by Ivy DeGagné) is one go-between, who’s embraced the duality of her environment and is learning Cree. And the lively Métis character Kahkakis (Colby Stockdale), who has a teasing brother-sister friendship with Ekah, is another. The two tracks intersect, along with Métis sashes, at the celebratory dinner and bi-cultural dance (choreographed by Rebecca Sadowski).

The preamble to the Treaty, as the play sets forth vividly, is not without people of good will. But by the time the play’s two tracks intersect once more and fatally, at the end, it’s all going wrong. And the fracture lines in the peace treaty are violently evident. The church, via the presence of a fiery racist priest, Father Gabriel (Cody Porter, who digs into the role), is an instigator. And you assume that light is shed on his viciousness in the play’s other track.

Rebecca Bissonnette, Dylan Thomas-Bouchier, Emily Berard in Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, Thou Art Here Theatre. Photo by Mat Simpson

Civil Blood wonders about the built-in power inequalities of a peace treaty in which the land isn’t shared and interpretation and enforcement reside on one side alone. The Nehiyaw are up against it when they sign. There’s a curse, there’s talk of “cages” and “fire that will never be put out.” All of that resonates with us, and in multiple ways (including this past week’s tragic reminders of our lethal inattention to the natural world).     

The 90-minute “traffic of our stage” sets about unspooling back from the present moment, and the dishonourable subterfuges of “reconciliation” to a crucial moment in our history. We know how the story has worked itself out in 2024. Did it have to be that way?

It seems important to ponder that (and from two perspectives). And Civil Blood take us on location.

REVIEW

Civil Blood: A Treaty Story

Theatre: Thou Art Here Theatre, co-presented by Common Ground Arts

Created by: Josh Languedoc and Neil Kuefler

Directed by: Neil Kuefler and Mark Vetsch

Starring: Emily Berard, Rebecca Bissonnette, Maria Buffalo, Ivy DeGagné, Doug Mertz, Christina Nguyen, Cody Porter, Elena Porter, Gabriel Richardson, Colby Stockdale, Dylan Thomas-Bouchier

Where: Old Fort, Fort Edmonton Park

Running: through Aug. 4

Tickets: tickets.fringetheatre.ca, on a pay-what-you-will scale