Cheyenne tale becomes canvas for modern story
By KAREN SHADE, 5/14/2006
Jana Rhoads (in front) with Deborah Hunter (left) and Irene Tiger in the play "The Woman Who Was Captured by Ghosts." STEPHEN PINGRY / Tulsa World
Julie Pearson-Little Thunder could have a change of heart before the curtain rises on the debut performance of her original play Wednesday. Nothing is set in stone.
She actually looks forward to the idea of rewriting her play, "The Woman Who Was Captured by Ghosts," a drama about a Cheyenne woman taking on the physical and spiritual fight against breast cancer.
"My script's changing every time they read," she said of the rehearsals. "I hear things that are wrong with it, or I see potential moments when the action isn't really saying what I want to say.
"It's really interesting when it goes off the page into people's voices. As a playwright you start hearing all the mistakes, but you also hear all the stuff that works."
"The Woman Who was Captured by Ghosts" is a Thunder Road Theater Company presentation. It will open with a special preview on Wednesday night, continue its run through Saturday. The current title was taken from the a traditional Cheyenne story of a crying little girl, whose mother sets her outside of the family's protective lodge. The girl is carried away by ghosts to another land and escapes back to her village, but not before she has undergone a journey of horrors, trials and discovery.
"The ghosts become a metaphor for breast cancer . . . I had a good friend who went through breast cancer treatment three years ago. Also, a cousin that I was very close to, her breast cancer came back, and (she) passed away just a couple of weeks ago," said Little Thunder.
The playwright, who is Creek, said she admired the courage and inner strength that women like her friend and her cousin were able to tap into to fight breast cancer.
"It was not just a physical trial, but it became a sort of spiritual journey. I was so amazed by her (friend's) bravery and her sense of humor and all the things she took into it.
"My cousin was the same way. She was such a fighter. This last time around, she didn't want to take any more treatments. It was just too hard on her, but she kept her sense of humor and her spirit," Little Thunder said.
The story follows the life of Marissa, a recently divorced, single mother in her late 40s who has just been diagnosed. Marissa, who will be played by Jana Rhoads, re-examines her decision to put away the traditional values she was raised with to fit into her non-Indian ex-husband's life and family.
Little Thunder said she has intertwined strains of surrealism into the play's plot, freely adapting the traditional story, which explains the origins of Cheyenne contrary warrior society.
"Women have to have a lot of courage to deal with what life shells out to you. These women who have gone through this experience have really been warriors, so that's why I wanted to use this idea of a traditional Cheyenne story in this way."
When rehearsals began four weeks ago, the playwright had little more than a concept for the play, but since then the script has developed.
Director T.J. Bowlin, who said he was initially interested in the play's title, said he also became intrigued with Little Thunder's concept of "flipping between the traditional story and a contemporary setting."
"I thought it was a challenge, a way of making myself grow by learning Native American traditions and making those work within my thoughts about contemporary life," he said.
The script has undergone rewrites through the course of rehearsals. "I know that it's very much a workshop production in that I'll go on and keep working on the script after the show (has finished this run)," Little Thunder said.
"THE WOMAN WHO WAS CAPTURED BY GHOSTS"
Presented by Thunder Road Theater Company
When
Special preview 8 p.m. Wednesday. Regular run 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday
Where
Nightingale Theater, 1416 E. Fourth St.
Admission
$5 for Wednesday preview; $10 general admission and $8 students/seniors Thursday-Saturday, 583-8487 [As of February 2007, 633-8666].