The Creole Theater Company, established since 2012 in Saint-Léonard, will celebrate its tenth birthday at a gala held on Friday to celebrate its essential role in the transmission and defense of Haitian and Creole culture in Montreal. Its director and co-founder, Ralph Civil, looks back on 10 years of theater, from Haiti to Saint-Léonard.
“The theater company comes from Haiti, in a period when there was a shortage of theatrical productions. It was in 1999 in Port-au-Prince. At that time, we were four actors,” recalls the former student of the National School of Arts in Haiti.
“We didn’t have a lot of texts to play,” he continues. For me, it was therefore more practical and lively to write, in French as in Creole, to continue [nos représentations]”.
The former actor turned playwright by force of circumstance gradually took a liking to writing, eventually abandoning the role of actor to devote himself to perfecting his writing and, more than anything, to satisfy his insatiable curiosity as a director. .
“Theatre is a medium that offers enormous possibilities. We do research on a range of subjects to interpret theatrical works,” explains the enthusiast.
Trances and transformations
In his adaptations as for his own plays, Ralph Civil has never been afraid to tackle the crises that have shaken the Haitian people.
“My theater is rather social. It deals with the history of my country, which has always been in crisis since my birth,” explains the playwright, who refers to the chronic political instability that has destabilized the Haitian state throughout its history, and which constitutes his subject of predilection.
Although he directs adaptations of “very classic” works such as Antigone or Waiting for Godot, Ralph Civil always places them in a very Haitian setting. “I really like Félix Morisseau-Leroy’s adaptation, which presents King Créon as a ‘head section’, a sort of head of state [à Haïti]. It remains in the imagination of all Haitians”, he illustrates in a sneering tone.
Social “hypnograms”, a term referring to the study of the phases of wakefulness and sleep, are also at the heart of Ralph Civil’s artistic process. “It’s a theatrical genre from Haitian culture that explores the relationship to trances linked to voodoo. It is the human who is transformed on the spiritual level, the social transformation through the individual”, explains the director.
Defend Haitian art in Montreal
The Compagnie Théâtre Créole now promotes other theater groups, a panoply of literary genres such as poetry and slam, but also Haitian visual artists, some of whose canvases have already adorned the walls of the Library of Saint-Leonard.
“I have lived in Saint-Léonard since I arrived [d’Haïti]. We encourage young people to do theatre, to write poetry, slams, and we invite them to activities such as poetry and theater training. Everything we do is particularly close to my heart,” rejoices the Léonardois, particularly proud, after 10 years of theater, of his adaptation of Waiting for Godot and his tribute to Antony Phelps, a renowned Haitian poet and novelist.
“We’re up to our necks in it, so much so that I can describe ourselves as advocates for black culture. Because we still feel badly represented, not visible enough. We must give our all to acquire and occupy the public place, deplores the director. We work day and night to advance the cause.”
In addition to the lack of visibility, he denounces in the same breath a perception of the theater which remains widespread, according to him, in Quebec. “It is often said that the theater is the poor relation of the arts, because it would not allow to feed its man.” This situation would further hamper the development of Creole theatre, according to the playwright.
The Compagnie Théâtre Créole hopes to be able to resume performances of its play 12th floor when classes return.
Civil Ralph: Screenwriter of a People in Crisis