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It’s a worst-nightmare scenario for some people: stranded in an elevator with a complete stranger. That includes director Herbie Barnes, although not for the claustrophobic reasons one may presume.
“One of the things I say when I’m teaching writing is that you never do a play in a car or in an elevator,” he says, “because you’re locked in and there’s not a lot of movement.”
While Elevate: Manaaji’idiwin doesn’t have much in the way of physical movement, Barnes recognized the power that it had to move conversations around power dynamics and reconciliation almost immediately.
“It’s got a really interesting battle that was going on in there,” he explained in an interview on Morning Light. “There was a really lovely conversation that went on. And the two people are likeable, which I really like as well.”
The two people in question – Jonesie (played by Kevin Klassen) and Tallahassee (played by Nolan Moberly) - are indeed stuck in an elevator on the way to an important work meeting in the final play of the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre’s 2024-2025 season. As they try and get out, they are forced to confront the power dynamics between them as settler and Indigenous people respectively and how they must navigate those conditions with no physical means of escaping them.
“I find that if the story works, it doesn’t matter [how] large or small a cast can be,” says Barnes, who has experience with sending small shows into large spaces in his career such as Tales of an Urban Indian.
Written by Minegoziibe Anishinabe playwright David McLeod, Elevate: Manaadji’idiwin was developed in the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre’s Pimootayowin Creators Circle. Led by award-winning theatre artist Ian Ross, the program mentors Indigenous theatre creators and writers in their creations while ensuring that their culture and practices always remain at the forefront. When it comes to Elevate: Manaaji’idiwin (the Anishinabe word meaning “to go easy on one another and all of Creation”), Barnes stresses the imperative of holding Indigenous culture’s importance above conventional theatre creation processes.
“The really important thing is that the leadership is given to the First Nations community,” says Barnes, “so they’re learning from each other and the voice is coming from them. The support is through RMTC, the voices are their own. That is a really important aspect of it beyond what other people tend to do, which is sort of try to manipulate First Nations voices into what is typically known as the ‘Western theatre’ voice.”
At the conclusion of a performance of Elevate: Manaaji’idiwin, Barnes (perhaps ironically given how he tells his students to not do this in their writing) imagines people in their cars leaving the Exchange District, and the conversations he hopes they will be having.
“It’s just being aware that we’re all part of the change that has to happen, I think, that’s really important.”
Elevate: Manaaji’idiwin officially opens on the RMTC’s John Hirsh Mainstage on April 24 and runs until May 17. Tickets and more information are available at the company’s website.