Wampanoag's 'We Are The Land' comes to Emerson's Cutler Majestic Theater for two shows

Before a pilgrim stepped foot in Massachusetts, the Wampanoag people were living on their land.

For more than 12,000 years, the tribe has inhabited what would becomes Massachusetts and eastern Rhode Island yet their stories are largely untold and written out of the history books.

Now, the story of the Wampanoag tribe will take the stage in “We Are The Land,” a play created by Wampanoag people telling their stories spanning over 400 years of colonization, during a special two-night performance hosted by ArtsEmerson at Emerson College's Cutler Majestic Theater in Boston.

“Its history is not taught in schools for children of the descendants of the colonizers, but it's also not often taught to our own people,” said Hartman Deetz, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe and one of the play’s creators. “This is a chance even for our own tribal people to learn some more about our own history and what our own ancestors (went) through.”

'We Are The Land' comes to Boston after British debut

“We Are The Land,” will be on stage at Cutler Majestic Theater at 8 p.m. Sept. 29 and 2 p.m. Sept. 30. Tickets are $25 to $93 but a select quantity of $10 tickets are available at 9 a.m. on the day of the show. Tickets can be purchased at ArtsEmerson.org, by calling the box office at 617-824-8400 or by visiting the box office at 559 Washington St., Boston.

“We Are The Land,” premiered earlier this year in Plymouth, England, after the Theater Royal company planned to host the Wampanoag in 2020 during a Mayflower 400 commemoration. Originally, 30 members of the Wampanoag tribe were slated to take part in a Theater Royal-created production, “This Land,” but the COVID-19 pandemic cancelled all planned Mayflower 400 programming.

“There had been a previous production put together by Theater Royal and it lacked the innovation of Native storytellers telling our own story,” Deetz said. “Thankfully, they were able to reflect and look at that and realize that the best way to tell an authentic story of what the Native people('s) experience with colonialism is like was to (have) Native people tell it themselves.”

When the world started to return to normal, Theater Royal contacted the Wampanoag with a new plan ― a Wampanoag-created production telling the stories of their ancestors and their relationship to their land.

The result was, “We Are The Land,” a play created by Deetz, Kitty Hendricks and Siobhan Brown alongside other members of the Wampanoag tribe, which tells the stories of the Wampanoag people over the four centuries since the Mayflower.

“We just tried to come up with a set of stories (that) take us through time over the past 400 years as the process of colonization is an ongoing one,” Deetz said. “It's not just something that happened when the Mayflower landed. It's something that continues to happen as we have to still fight for our recognition as a tribal people. As we (are) still being dispossessed of land as we speak.”

The play touches on aspects of the spirit world — like Moshup, the Wampanoag’s legendary giant — the damaging impacts of Christianization including the stories of Joseph Sassman and Rev. Joseph Amos, the redlining and gentrification of the 70s, the tribe’s fight for federal recognition in 2007 and the impacts of those events in present day.

“At the end of the show, we all have a small section of how we believe or what we went through and that's what's really going to touch (everyone’s) hearts,” Vanessa Mendes, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe said. “That gives the true sense of a real feeling, not portraying what our ancestors went through. I think that the very end of the show is going to be really powerful.”

As for its reception in England? The Lord Mayor of Plymouth shed a few tears during the performance if that's any indication.

“They had the attitudes that (we) can't change history, but we want to correct it as much as possible and give the respect to the Wampanoag people after what they had done to our ancestors,” Mendes said. “Some of them were really cordial about it and others were mad at what their English (people) had done.”

One English audience member, according to Deetz, apologized to her seat neighbor, a Taiwanese man, at the end of the show for the atrocities committed by her ancestors.

“...At the end of the show, she turns to him and she expressed that she descended from the missionaries who went and (preached) the Christian faith and did missionary work in Taiwan,” he said. “She actually apologized for her ancestors' actions… I (was) really touched by that, that people were able to take that away and understand that this was a thing ... If that person was able to sort of do some self-reflection and was able to say some sort of (apology) or make some kind of amends to an actual person that was impacted by the efforts of their ancestors, that's great because that means that we can start again on a footing as equals where we're all respected as humans.”

'We Are The Land' predicted to sell out Emerson's Cutler Majestic Theater

Now, “We Are The Land” will take the stage at the Cutler Majestic Theater.

“...Here we're going to be in front of our other tribal members and others that know our story," Kitty Hendricks, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe said. "…We really want to make it right…Do it justice…Make our tribal community proud of us. Being in the Athens of the country, Boston, on the stage and (in the) theater district, to me, that's a big deal.”

The play’s connection to ArtsEmerson goes back to preparation for its Plymouth performance as they helped the tribe with rehearsals, staging and other preliminary production matters.

“Our support was in the artists,” said Susan Chinsen, creative producer for ArtsEmerson. “Giving them the resources so that they could do the rehearsals that they needed and get paid for the time that they were putting into this. I think the relationship there was making (the) commitment (that) it wouldn't just be presented in Plymouth, England, but it would also be presented here in Boston and that would be through (an) ArtsEmerson stage.”

For Hendricks, the play is a new vessel for the tribe to share its story.

“Just being able to use that genre, the form of the art of theater (to) tell our story has never been done,” she said. “In a way, it's a way of decolonizing theater as well and the way they go about telling stories and representing marginalized people.”

According to Chinsen, “We Are The Land” is “on track” to sell out the Cutler Majestic, Emerson’s largest theater at nearly 1,200 seats.

“I already can tell people coming in and leaving the theater will be changed,” she said. “It's just going to be a very different experience than what anyone would typically expect coming to see a show.”

Hendricks hopes audiences leave with a higher regard for the land they live on and renewed respect for Native people.

“(I) hope that they take away realizing the importance of the land that they walk upon,” she said. "Knowing that it's important to all people, not just Wampanoag people, because we're depending so much (on) what we've done to the land, to this point, we still can undo. And to look at the perspectives of Native people and their relationship with the land, respect that if you respect something (that) nurtures you and keeps you alive, then maybe you'll treat it differently. Also to be aware and respect the Wampanoag people and all Native people.”

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This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: 'We Are The Land' to perform at Emerson's Cutler Majestic Theater