About the Play:

Winner of the 2017 Governor General's Literary Award for Drama (Canadian equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize)

Indian Arm is a full-length drama by Hiro Kanagawa. After years of resenting her role as mother to a disabled son, longing for a time when she and her husband Alfred could be together as they used to be, Rita gets her wish. This modern adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's classic play Little Eyolf is a ruthless exploration of what it means to live together, to lose everything, and to survive unimaginable grief.

Indian Arm is based on Little Eyolf by Henrik Ibsen, and transplanted from 19th-century Norway to present-day Vancouver. Rita and Alfred Allmers live in an isolated family cabin on native leasehold land overlooking Indian Arm, a still untamed glacial fjord just north of Vancouver, BC. With Alfred – a formerly promising novelist – now struggling with his latest work, Rita has been tasked with caring for their adopted son Wolfie, a sensitive First Nations teen who has been designated as "special needs" for much of his life. Rita's resentments and frustrations are further embittered by her younger half-sister, Asta, a constant reminder of the innocence, idealism, and sexual allure Rita once had and yearns for again. The fragile impasse of their lives is torn asunder by the appearance of Janice, the surviving member of the Indigenous family who leased the land to Rita and Asta's reclusive and mysterious father over fifty years ago. With the lease now expired, they are all engulfed by the secrets and contradictions of their lives and of the land itself – in both the past and the present – and their stories are drawn inexorably toward an unspeakable tragedy.

Indian Arm premiered in 2015 at Studio 16 in Vancouver. It won the 2015 Jessie Award for Outstanding Original Script and the 2017 Governor General's Literary Award for Drama.

Cast: 3 women, 2 men

What people say:

"Indian Arm will sneak up on you and rip open your heart." — Vancouver Presents

"A major accomplishment." — The Georgia Straight

"…an intense emotional puzzle that stays with you long after the lights go down." — The Vancouver Sun

About the Playwright:

Hiro Kanagawa is a Vancouver-based actor, playwright, screenwriter, and teacher. Although best known as an actor, he was a story editor on several critically-acclaimed Canadian television series: Da Vinci's Inquest, Da Vinci's City Hall, Intelligence, and Blackstone. His plays Tiger of Malaya and The Patron Saint of Stanley Park have been performed across Canada. His distinctions include an Asians on Film award and Jessie Richardson Awards for both acting and writing. He teaches playwriting at Capilano University and is a Playwrights' Theatre Centre Associate.