Touchstone Theatre opens landmark 50th season with Women of the Fur Trade, September 24 to October 4

Frances Končan’s historical satire follows three women as they share their views on life, love, and Louis Riel

SPONSORED POST BY Touchstone Theatre

Women of the Fur Trade. Photo by Fred Cattroll

 
 

Touchstone Theatre launches its 50th anniversary season with the acclaimed revival of Women of the Fur Trade by Anishinaabe and Slovene playwright Frances Končan.

Following its 2024 premiere at the National Arts Centre Indigenous Theatre in Ottawa and Native Earth Performing Arts in Toronto—where it garnered a Dora Mavor Moore Award nomination for Outstanding New Play—this production is being remounted by Touchstone Theatre and Western Canada Theatre Company, in association with UBC Theatre & Film. It will run from September 24 to October 4 at UBC’s Frederic Wood Theatre.

A rip-roaring satire of survival and cultural inheritance, Women of the Fur Trade shifts the spotlight from the male gaze to women’s power. Against the backdrop of the Canadian fur trade in a Red River fort circa “eighteen hundred and something something”, three women sip tea and debate revolution, colonization, and the sex appeal of Louis Riel.

Marie-Angelique, a Métis Taurus with a plan, is busy writing bold love letters to Riel, convinced they’re fated. Ojibwe Sagittarius trapper Eugenia brings word of the rebellion back to the fort, but isn’t impressed with the “overrated” Riel. Meanwhile, European settler Cecilia, a pregnant Virgo anxiously awaiting her husband’s return, secretly pines over Thomas Scott—who, unbeknownst to her, is the one actually responding to Marie-Angelique’s letters.

Blending sharp wit, pop-culture nods, modern slang, and incisive historical commentary, Women of the Fur Trade hilariously flips the script on colonial, male-centric narratives, placing three unforgettable women at its heart. Končan’s storytelling power has carried the work from its Toronto Fringe Festival debut to Stratford Festival success, and it has now become one of the most widely produced plays in Canada.

Women of the Fur Trade is directed by Renae Morriseau. It stars Kelsey Kanatan Wavey of Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre’s The Rez Sisters, Cheri Maracle of the Arts Club Theatre Company’s Father Tartuffe: an Indigenous Misadventure, and Columpa Bobb of the Firehall Arts Centre’s White Noise, plus Victor Hunter and Jonathan Fisher.

Two post-show talkbacks will take place: Métis History with Tai Amy Grauman on September 28, and Truth & Reconciliation with Morriseau on September 30.

For tickets and more information, visit Touchstone Theatre.


Post sponsored by Touchstone Theatre.

 
 
 

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