Rise, Red River

“The map of the land is in our blood.”

A woman trawls the bottom of a riverbed with a makeshift plough, hoping to dislodge something—anything. The world has drastically changed: rivers run dry, rampant bushfires leave little left to burn. Still she persists searching for the stories of her loved ones, maybe even her own. She is not alone—an ancestor watches nearby. This desolate landscape is about to unearth its long-held secrets.

Inspired by the grassroots organization Drag the Red, which searches for evidence of missing Indigenous and settler women, girls, 2 Spirit, and people of all genders in the Red River of Treaty One Territory, this ethereal and engrossing drama is a profound offering to those who persevere in spite of sorrow. Told in Anishinaabemowin, English, and French, Tara Beagan’s prophetic play draws a direct connection between the treatment of Indigenous peoples and the abuse inflicted on the land. Fluid and majestic like the river itself, Rise, Red River is an invocation, a revelation, and a call to action.

• The work is in three languages—both official colonizer languages and a language that came from this land before European contact.
• Former AD of Prairie Theatre Exchange, Thomas Morgan Jones, contacted Tara about writing a piece exploring climate change. The play was directly inspired by the grassroots organization Drag the Red. The play illuminates the ways Indigenous women, girls, and 2 Spirit people are treated and how that treatment directly reflects the abuse inflicted on the land. “Climate crisis” has a direct correlation to the so-called #MMIWG2S.
• Rise, Red River was first produced by ARTICLE 11, Théâtre Cercle Molière, and Prairie Theatre Exchange in Treaty 1, at Théâtre Cercle Molière, Winnipeg, from March 8 to 23, 2024.