By Jean Marc Dalpé & David Granger & Laura Lussier & Alexis Martin & Andrea Menard & Yvette Nolan & Gilles Poulin-Denis & Paula-Jean Prudat & Mansel Robinson & Kenneth T. Williams
Translated by Jean Marc Dalpé & Alexis Martin & Alexis Diamond & Maureen Labonté & Fanny Britt & Marjorie Beaucage & Randy Morin
Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show / Le Wild West Show de Gabriel Dumont is a flamboyant epic, constructed as a series of tableaux, about the struggles of the Métis in the Canadian West. It is a bilingual book, co-published with Éditions Prise de parole, and enhanced with a historical background, a chronology of the Métis Resistances, and visual documents. It is a multilayered and entertaining saga with a rodeo vibe, loosely based on Buffalo Bill’s legendary outdoor travelling show. In 1885, following the hanging of his friend Louis Riel, bison hunter Gabriel Dumont fled to the United States. There he was recruited by the legendary Buffalo Bill, founder of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, a gigantic outdoor travelling show that re-enacted life in the American West. It made a huge impression on Dumont, and he dreamed of putting together a similar show to tell the story of the struggle of the Métis to reclaim their rights.
The creative team behind Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show – including fifteen authors and translators, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, French- and English-speaking men and women – brings Dumont’s dream to life in a captivating, joyously anachronistic saga. The theatrical version of Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show presented by the National Arts Centre was one of a number of exceptional projects funded through the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter initiative. (Adapted from nac-cna.ca/en/wildwestshow.)
Cast of 5 women and 5 men, of Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds.
“Really excellent. I laughed till I cried!”—Marilou Lamontagne, ICI Radio-Canada Ottawa-Gatineau
“[A] play that pleases, puzzles, and provokes, in a form that keeps shifting wildly from one moment to the next like a bucking bronco.”—J. Kelly Nestruck, Globe and Mail
“If Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show is so successful, while being funny and sad at the same time, it’s because the creative team did its research and listened to the communities involved in the rehabilitating of the figure of Gabriel Dumont. What takes shape here is a wave of madness and a rewriting of our national narrative.”—Maud Cucchi, JEU Revue de théâtre
“Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show is a crazed, fast-paced Métis 101 history lesson, in which acidity and humour deliver the story.”—Martin Vanasse, Radio-Canada
“Full of life, even hectic, filled with surprises, colours, humour, and an agenda that can only be endorsed.”—Marie-Claire Girard, HuffPost Québec
“[A] seamlessly cohesive narrative ... a zany form ... a phantasmagorical piece of pure entertainment ... a delirious blend of historical drama, musical, burlesque cabaret, hockey night, and TV quiz!”—Pierre-Alexandre Buisson, Bible urbaine
“Entertaining and informative, with a self-critical and self-deprecating humour, this gigantic historical fresco enters like a buffalo stampede and provides a breath of fresh air.”—Yanik Comeau, Théâtralités
“Between bursts of laughter (of the uneasy sort at times) and moments of lively emotion, Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show takes [us] on a journey up hill and down dale through the history of the Métis Resistances and tells an oft-forgotten part of our collective history.”—Valérie Lessard, Le Droit
By Jean Marc Dalpé
Playwright, novelist, poet, screenwriter and actor Jean Marc Dalpé is a three-time recipient of the Governor General’s Literary Award: for his play Le Chien in 1988, for his anthology of plays Il n’y a que l’amour in 1999, and for his debut novel Un vent se lève qui éparpille (published in English as Scattered in a Rising Wind) in 2000.
By Alexis Martin
A graduate of the Conservatoire d’art dramatique de Montréal, Alexis Martin has appeared in more than 40 stage plays and several movies and TV series, including Les Boys, Beaux Malaises, and Les Parent, and worked with such outstanding directors as Robert Lepage, Pierre Falardeau, Luc Picard and Denis Villeneuve.
By Yvette Nolan
Born in Saskatchewan to an Algonquin mother and an Irish immigrant father, Yvette Nolan graduated from the University of Manitoba in 1997. She is an accomplished playwright: her plays include BLADE, Job’s Wife, Annie Mae’s Movement, The Birds (a modern adaptation of Aristophanes’ comedy), and The Unplugging.
By Paula-Jean Prudat
PJ Prudat was born in a fierce snowstorm in Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan, Treaty 6 Territory. She is a proud Half-Breed of Cree, Saulteaux, Scandinavian, French and Métis Nation (ancestral to Batoche and Red River) blood. PJ is a recipient of the 2017 REVEAL Indigenous Art Award and a finalist for both the K.M. Hunter Award and the Cayle Chernin Award.
By Mansel Robinson
Mansel Robinson’s voice has been heard across Canada through his plays, which have been staged in Calgary, Saskatoon, Edmonton, Ottawa and Montreal; three of them – Ghost Trains (Trains fantômes), Spitting Slag (Slague. L’histoire d’un mineur) and Two Rooms (II [deux]) – have been translated into French by Jean Marc Dalpé. Mansel has received numerous awards and was shortlisted for the prestigious Siminovitch Prize in Theatre for playwriting.
By Kenneth T. Williams
Kenneth T. Williams is a Cree playwright from the George Gordon First Nation in Saskatchewan’s Treaty 4 territory, and is the first Indigenous person to earn an M.F.A. in playwriting from the University of Alberta. His plays have been produced across Canada; they include Care, Café Daughter, Gordon Winter, Thunderstick, Bannock Republic, Suicide Notes, and Three Little Birds.
Translated by Jean Marc Dalpé
Playwright, novelist, poet, screenwriter and actor Jean Marc Dalpé is a three-time recipient of the Governor General’s Literary Award: for his play Le Chien in 1988, for his anthology of plays Il n’y a que l’amour in 1999, and for his debut novel Un vent se lève qui éparpille (published in English as Scattered in a Rising Wind) in 2000.
Translated by Alexis Martin
A graduate of the Conservatoire d’art dramatique de Montréal, Alexis Martin has appeared in more than 40 stage plays and several movies and TV series, including Les Boys, Beaux Malaises, and Les Parent, and worked with such outstanding directors as Robert Lepage, Pierre Falardeau, Luc Picard and Denis Villeneuve.
news | 2021-05-11
Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show / Le Wild West Show de Gabriel Dumont, a bilingual co-publication, has arrived!
…with Franco-Ontarian publisher Prise de Parole of Gabriel Dumont’s Wild West Show / Le Wild West Show de Gabriel Dumont , a bilingual book enhanced with a historical …
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