Coal Mine Theatre & Paper Canoe Initiatives/Prophecy Fog, created and carried out by Jani Lauzon, directed by Franco Boni, Coal Mine Theatre, till Dec. 10. Tickets right here.

Prophecy Fog is an completely stunning present that may be a welcome remount from 2019. You’ll go away the manufacturing feeling that you’ve got been touched in some profound approach — when you permit your self to be swept up within the ceremony and the storytelling.

The play is a non secular expertise, however not some airy-fairy, pie-in-the-sky model of pop mysticism. Fairly, creator and performer Jani Lauzon, who’s of Métis ancestry, takes us together with her as she explores the myths and prophecies embedded in her Indigenous roots, notably the tales within the stones.

The seating at Coal Mine is sort of a therapeutic circle. We encompass the performer whereas above us is a canvas chandelier evoking the picture of a tipi. Panels on the interior sides of this round display, show, at numerous occasions, scenes of nature, each land and sky, in addition to images and movies that illustrate Lauzon’s textual content. The attractive set, each above and under, has come from the fertile thoughts of environmental designer Melissa Joakim.

In the course of the seating is the charismatic, barefoot Lauzon, carrying a easy white shirt and trousers, standing on a native-design carpet. She is surrounded by picket bowl after picket bowl stuffed with rocks of all sizes. A whole lot of them, in reality. These stones, as she says in her program notes, are her scene companions, and collectively they carry out the ritual that’s the play Prophecy Fog.

It was her mom who first informed Lauzon that each stone has a narrative, and the lion’s share of the play is Lauzon looking out via these rocks, discovering a selected one, and telling us its particular person story. By way of these stones, the intelligent script additionally reveals points of Lauzon’s private life, in addition to larger myths from Indigenous tradition. What a marvellous weaving collectively of the sacred and the secular this present is, together with pleasant bouts of humour and forays into enchanting music, each track and instrumental.

There may be, nevertheless, a fly within the ointment, or extra to the purpose, a desecrated sacred house, and that’s the seven-storey tall, so-called Large Rock, a monumental piece of an exploded star that landed in California’s Mojave Desert tens of millions of years in the past. For Lauzon, Large Rock has particular which means as a result of, as she tells us a number of occasions, her ancestors believed they got here from the celebs, that “we’re star individuals”.

This arresting piece of pure structure was sacred to the native Indigenous tribes who inscribed their petroglyphs on the rock, and used it to point their tenting locations, and held their ceremonies round it. When the White males got here, they got the Indigenous land, supplanting the individuals who have been there. The place round Large Rock was now referred to as Homestead Valley.

Prophecy Fog comprises historic accounts of the extra distinguished White males and the way they interfaced with Large Rock. When Lauzon and her daughter go on a pilgrimage to Large Rock, maybe probably the most surprising second of the play is what they discover there.

On the finish of Prophecy Fog, we’ve heard fascinating myths reminiscent of why North America known as Turtle Island, however we’ve additionally witnessed how troublesome it’s for Indigenous individuals to cling to their traditions as soon as the White settlers have touched the sacred floor. Kudos to director Franco Boni for his cautious, detailed course, and Brian Quirt for his dramaturgy on this marvellous script.

Lauzon, who’s a ten-time Dora nominated author/performer/producer, and a three-time Juno nominated singer/songwriter, amongst her many honours, is a multidisciplinary artist of epic proportions. At age 64, she has the knowledge and expertise to carry us in her thrall, but she by no means preaches, or throws out salvos of victimhood.

In Prophecy Fog, all of Lauzon’s manifold expertise as a storyteller come collectively to create a fascinating night of theatrical magic.

Are you trying to promote an occasion? Have a information tip? Must know the most effective occasions occurring this weekend? Ship us a word.

#LUDWIGVAN

Get the day by day arts information straight to your inbox.

Join the Ludwig Van Toronto e-Blast! — native classical music and opera information straight to your inbox HERE.

Paula Citron is a Toronto-based freelance arts journalist and broadcaster who hosts her personal web site, paulacitron.ca. For over 25 years, she was senior dance author for The Globe and Mail, affiliate editor of Opera Canada journal, arts reviewer for Classical 96.3 FM, and dance previews contributor to Toronto Life journal. She has been a visitor lecturer for numerous cultural teams and universities, notably on the function of the critic/reviewer, and has been a panellist on COC podcasts. Earlier than assuming a full-time journalism profession, Ms. Citron was a member of the drama division of the Claude Watson College for the Arts.

Newest posts by Paula Citron (see all)