First Voices Festival - What Are You?

CRITIC’S PICK: First Voices Festival, 7 Stages Theatre - Among the events scheduled for this celebration of indigenous cultures, now in its third year, is an “immersive theatrical journey” (a play of sorts, I’m guessing) titled ‘What Are You.’ It’s produced by performance artist Nicolette Emanuelle, a practitioner of “experiential alchemy” who uses absurd humor, original music, dance and a game show to express the intricacies of multiracial existence in the United States. On Nov. 16 & 17, a Powwow will feature an intertribal mashup of culture, song, crafts, food and pageantry with dancers in full regalia. A special guest is Muscogee elder William Harjo, a storyteller and flute maker. Entrance is free. Then, on Nov. 29 at 7 p.m., a new documentary film will be screened that chronicles the Wisconsin-based tribe named Bad River Band and its battle to save Lake Superior, the largest freshwater resource in the country. “We gotta protect it… die for it, if we have to,” says Eldred Corbine, a Bad River Tribal Elder. - Kevin C. Madigan