http://www.insightnews.com/aesthetics.asp?mode=display&articleID=3916

Playwright-poet-actor-performer-book author puts genius where her mouth is

By Dwight Hobbes | dwight@...
Updated 2/19/2008 5:59:05 PM

Marcie Rendon. Mention her name in Twin Cities arts circles. Eyebrows arch
and ears perk up. From grassroots organizations struggling on the sidelines
to well-moneyed outfits, Rendon's reputation is one of artistic excellence
articulating piercing commentary. For all that everybody and their sister
talk about a need for change, this nationally accomplished
playwright-poet-actor-performer-book author puts genius where her mouth is.
Her drama SongCatcher (History Theater), Wisconsin Library Association
Outstanding Book Award-winning children's book Pow Wow Summer (Carolrhoda
Press) and the prestigious St. Paul Company's Leadership in Neighborhoods
(LIN) award don't come near representing the breadth of Rendon's work.
However, they flag this career firebrand as an artistic force with which it
is wise to seriously reckon. Marcie Rendon gave Insight News an interview,
discussing what she's up to these days.

INSIGHT NEWS: You're on the bill at "The Artists' Platform;" theme being
foreign and domestic policy. You contribute spoken word on occupied lands.
There can't be any more occupied lands, outside Australia I guess, than
America.

MARCIE RENDON: There is something about the Christian mindset that says,
"All we have to do is apologize and all will be well. It is like saying
your nighttime prayers with the full belief that God will forgive you no
matter what you have done. Which God can do. However, I think that these
are human lives that have been impacted by human action. And it is human
action that needs to happen to right the wrongs. How I personally try to
right wrongs, is [to] apologize. Then I try to undo the damage I have done;
and consciously with full intention try to never again do the wrong.
Governmental apologies seem to only make the apologizer feel better about
themselves, without any actual attempt made to right the wrongs or create
governmental policy to insure that similar wrongs are not done again.

IN: Just how widely has your play Free Frybread been seen?

MR: Free Frybread started in the Fringe at Bryant Lake Bowl, then went to
the Fringe at the Minnesota Women's Club and from there to St. Croix Casino
dinner theater. A version of it played at Intermedia Arts, a banquet dinner
show for Native American foster parents and a cut of the musical medleys
was performed at MCTC Native spring show. This show propelled me to create
Raving Native Productions to do creative [theatre] shows in and around
Indian country, outside of so-called traditional western staged [theatre].

IN: What prompted you to write it?

MR: Back in 1998 I got the St. Paul LIN grant to "create a viable Native
presence" in the Twin Cities theatre community. I pulled Native [artists]
together and started tossing out ideas. A core group of us worked together
to create Free Frybread and a number of other more "site-specific" pieces
around the Twin Cities. This work has evolved to residencies throughout
Indian country, through Hanay Giegemo's UCLA Project Hoop for Native
Theatre. I have traveled to six or seven Native reservations and urban
communities and taught this process of creating site-specific theatre that
was developed and fine-tuned when creating Free Frybread.

IN: What's up with Raving Native Theatre Company these past years?

MR: We did a show at the Mana Fest, a fringe-type festival focusing on the
spiritual back in August '07. I pulled together Mark Erickson, a Native
singer/storyteller; Rosy Simas, a Native modern dancer; and Bobby Wilson,
Native Spoken word artist and then Simone Rendon [daughter] in her infamous
show hostess role that she first developed in Free Frybread to be the
hostess for the Mana Fest show. In May, Dean Seal is pulling together
another manifestation of the spiritual fest, this time called Spirit in the
House. It will be May 23-June 1 at Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church.
I am writing Stands Alone – The hour-long show will feature a story about a
Native woman's connection to spirit; the belief that we are all the next
seventh generation. It will feature, in her first acting role on stage,
Sarah Agaton Howe from the Fond du Lac Reservation.

Marcie Rendon is at The Artists' Platform February 22 and 23, 8:00 p.m.,
Patrick's Cabaret, 3010 Minnehaha Ave. So., Mpls. Tickets: $8 in
advance/$10 at the door. Reservations: tickets@....