Who's Who in the Cast
JaeLyn Forthun (Shuswap/Okanogan Band Confederated Colville Tribes) (Antíkoni)
JaeLyn has been heavily involved in the performing arts scenes throughout the Pacific Northwest since 2014, working as stage manager and performing as a dancer predominantly in Portland theater productions, as well as organizing and performing with artists troupes at local events. She is incredibly excited to take part in Antíkoni, her first play reading and first speaking role.
CarliAnn Forthun Bruner (Ismene/Sister/Limiwt)
CarliAnn is a dancer, choreographer, educator, and multi-disciplinary storyteller of Syilx (Okanogan) band of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, Secwepemc (Shuswap), and of mixed-European descent. She received a BFA in dance from Simon Fraser University in 2012 and a MFA in dance at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 2021. Since receiving her formal education, CarliAnn has been on a scholarly and personal journey to more fully understand her Indigenous heritage, using her dance and embodiment to uncover ways of knowing the world that were once taken from her ancestors.
She often collaborates with artists of other disciplines, creating dance for film, theater, galleries, and performance. At the root, CarliAnn’s work is a physical investigation of relationships to nature, human beings, and spirit, and stories from the past or of the imagined future. One of her primary goals with her dances is for it to resonate with the audience and inspire self-reflection.
Bruner’s choreography has been presented by On the Boards, Seattle International Dance Festival, 91³Ô¹ÏÍø University, and other organizations in the PNW. She has performed professionally and toured with Khambatta Dance Company, Intrepidus Dance, 127th St. Dance Company, and as a freelance performer. She founded and directed Forthun+Rome Dance Theater with Ethan Rome from 2016 - 2019.
CarliAnn has enjoyed touring internationally in Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Lithuania, and India. Bruner has had residencies through James Ray Residency from Seattle International Dance Festival, Inlay Dance, and 91³Ô¹ÏÍø University. She is a recipient of the 2023 Artist Trust GAP grant.
Currently, CarliAnn is an adjunct professor of dance at 91³Ô¹ÏÍø University, where she teaches technique, arts leadership, and improvisation, among other subjects. As an educator, CarliAnn's goals are to encourage each student on their own movement journeys and to feel more trusting of and comfortable in their own bodies.
Devon Peone (Spokane) (Kreon/Cannibal)
Devon was born and raised on the Spokane Indian Reservation. His parents are Tiger and Monica Peone. His paternal grandparents are Cub & Gracia Peone, and his maternal grandparents are Mickey Kirishian and Theresa Healy. Over the last ten years, Devon has been focused on learning and teaching several Interior Salish languages. Also, he participates every summer in several Canoe Journeys. "Telling stories is a very big part of our culture. Then, to be on our homelands, near the falls, it is an honor to be a part of this. lem lmtš."
Ryan/Keahu Booth (Upper Skagit) (Haemon/Brother)
Ryan/Keahu hails from the Skagit River Valley in Washington state. He grew up in La Conner, WA, but knew he wanted to see more of the world. He graduated from Loyola University Chicago with a double major in history & philosophy. He worked for the West Coast Jesuits, National Park Service, Heritage University, and now for Washington State University in Pullman. He earned his PhD in history from WSU in 2021. When he isn’t thinking about history, he enjoys visiting friends, traveling backroads, participating in spiritual ceremonies, and serving his cat, Ollie.
Jeff Ferguson (Spokane) (Guard/Tairasias/Pissing Boy)
Jeff is a freelance photo/videographer and Elk Soup Executive Director, Jeff Ferguson is a Spokane Tribal member who holds an A.A.S. in Photography from Spokane Falls Community College, a B.A. in Communications from Whitworth University and an M.B.A. from 91³Ô¹ÏÍø University. He has served as a panelist for Artist Trust in Seattle and was appointed to the Spokane Arts Commission by former Spokane City Mayor Mary Verner.
Robbie Paul, PhD (Auntie 1/Drum)
Robbie is an enrolled Nez Perce (Ni mii puu) tribal member. Daughter of Titus J. Paul and Maxine S. Caster Paul. Dr. Paul’s research focused on her family’s intergeneration historical trauma and healing. This involved researching five generations of her Nez Perce family going back to 1793 to her great-great grandfather Chief Ut-Sin-Malikan. Dr. Paul developed a healing model for her family to begin the healing journey that affected her family. Dr. Paul retired October 2016 from Washington State University Spokane as the Founding Director of Native American Health Sciences. Serves on the Center for Native American Research and Collaboration Affiliates and Associates for Washington State University Tribal Relations and serves on Oregon Health Sciences School of Medicine Native American Advisory Board.
Dr. Paul curated an exhibit at Washington State University Titled: Grandfather's Trunk Spirit of Survival: Three Generations of the Paul Family's Native American Boarding School Experience. The exhibit opened October 25, 2019 and closed September 2020. The Exhibit is now at the Nez Perce National Park, Spalding, Idaho, on the Nez Perce Reservation.
Dr. Paul submitted a book to Washington State University Press titled “Listening to the Birds: A Nez Perce Woman’s Journey of Self-discovery and Healing” on the Paul Family and Intergenerational Trauma and Healing, hoping for publication in the fall of 2024.
Margo Hill, JD, MURP (Auntie 2/Wife)
Margo is a Spokane Tribal member and grew up on the Spokane Indian reservation. She serves as the Associate Director of Small, Urban, Rural and Tribal Center on Mobility (SURTCOM). Dr. Hill served as the Spokane Tribal Attorney for 10 years and as a Coeur d’Alene Tribal Court Judge. Ms. Hill earned her Juris Doctorate from 91³Ô¹ÏÍø School of Law and her Master of Urban and Regional Planning from Eastern Washington University. Her Bachelor’s degree is in Political Science from University of Washington. Margo Hill is faculty at Eastern Washington University where she teaches Planning Law and Legislation, Community Development, Planning Implementation, Administrative Law, Community Development, Tribal Planning classes and American Indian Law.
Twa-le Abrahamson (Auntie 3/Grizzly Bear)
Twa-Le is enrolled Spokane and a descendant of the Colville, Coeur d’Alene and Navajo Nations. She has two daughters who are her strength, motivation and inspiration. Twa-le is a graduate from the University of Washington with a degree in environmental studies and a minor in restoration ecology. She has been a social, health and environmental justice organizer for over 20 years. She worked for several years in Natural Resource management for the Spokane Tribe, and was recognized by the USEPA for outstanding community education and outreach along with Jeff Ferguson, Rachel Crow-Spreading Wings and Yvonne Abrahamson for their production of “InnerTribal Beat,” a Native American news and music show focused on environmental news in the northwest region.
Twa-le recently worked for the Washington State Human Rights Commission as a Civil Rights Investigator and is currently the Executive Director of the Indigenous Rights and Reparation Foundation, and serves on the Washington State Office of Equity Community Advisory Board and the Indigenous Environmental Network Board of Directors.
Beth Piatote (Nez Perce enrolled Colville Confederated Tribes) (Playwright)
Beth Piatote is an associate professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California Berkeley. She is the author of two books: the scholarly monograph Domestic Subjects: Gender, Citizenship, and the Law in Native American Literature (Yale 2013), which received honorable mention from the Modern Language Association for the 2014 Prize for Studies in Native American Literatures, Cultures, and Languages; and the mixed-genre collection, The Beadworkers: Stories (Counterpoint 2019), which was long-listed for the Aspen Words Literary Prize and the PEN/Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection, and short-listed for the California Independent Booksellers Association “Golden Poppy” Prize for Fiction. The Beadworkers has been featured on NPR and selected as the “one read” for multiple university and community programs. Her full-length play, Antikoni, has been supported by workshops and public readings with Native Voices at the Autry, New York Classical Theatre, and the Indigenous Writers Collaborative at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival; and her short play, Tricksters, Unite! was featured in the 2022 Native Voices Short Play Festival. She currently holds a playwriting fellowship with AlterTheatre. Her creative and scholarly work has appeared in Kenyon Review, Epiphany, Poetry, World Literature Today, PMLA, American Quarterly, American Literary History, and other major journals and anthologies. She has served as a judge for literary awards for PEN America and the Poetry Foundation. She is currently working on a scholarly monograph on the representation of Native American legal systems through sensory representations (sound, visuality, synesthesia, and haunting) in texts across the long twentieth century; a collection of poems, and a collection of essays.
Beth’s research interests include Native American and Indigenous literature and history, arts, and law; Nez Perce language and literature, and Indigenous language revitalization more broadly; and creative writing. She co-created and now chairs the Designated Emphasis in Indigenous Language Revitalization at Berkeley. Currently she serves as the Director of the Arts Research Center, where she has established the Indigenous Poetics Lab to support artistic expression as a means of language revitalization. She holds a PhD in Modern Thought and Literature from Stanford University. She is Nez Perce and an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.
Jeanette Harrison (Director)
Jeanette is an award-winning actor, director, producer, and screenwriter. Most recently, she was associate director for the Broadway premiere of The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse (dir: Rachel Chavkin). Other recent directing credits include a filmed adaptation of Snag by Tara Moses, and a two-week workshop of Four Women in Red by Laura Shamas, with Native Voices at the Autry and La Jolla Playhouse. Jeanette spent most of her career in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she co-founded AlterTheater, and worked on stage, in casting, and as a director with most Bay Area theaters, including Playwrights Foundation (director, Real Time Remix by Jaisey Bates), Cutting Ball (Marcus Gardley’s …and Jesus Moonwalks the Mississippi, BATCC Award, Best Production), Berkeley Rep, Magic Theatre, Aurora Theatre, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, CalShakes, Golden Thread Productions, Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, Sonoma County Rep, Sonoma Shakespeare Festival, Actors Theater, Theatre Rhino, among others. At AlterTheater, she architected the ground-breaking AlterLab playwright residency program, and has shepherded more than 25 new plays to world premiere productions. She directed AlterTheater's world premiere of AlterLab commission COW PIE BINGO by Larissa FastHorse, the world premiere of CIRCULAR by Laura Shamas, and the multi-Theatre Bay Area award-winning production THE AMEN CORNER by James Baldwin. She also co-directed (with Ann Brebner) AlterLab-developed THE RIVER BRIDE by Marisela Treviño Orta, and LANDLESS by Larissa FastHorse, which won the USA Pen Literary Award in Drama. Her dramaturgical credits include Sapience by Diana Burbano at Artists Repertory Theatre, where she served as artistic director (Oct 2022-Sep 2023), and Ghosts of Bogotá by Diana Burbano with AlterTheater which premiered and ran until Feb. 23, 2020. She wrote a half-hour comedy about family and cultural identity, FEATHERS AND DOTS, DOTS AND FEATHERS (story by Jeanette Harrison and Sharmila Devar). She was Head Writer for the webseries The Breakdown (3 seasons), and a staff writer for the webseries Coach Dan. In 2019, she was part of the inaugural Native Animation Lab with LA Skins Fest, where she developed and later wrote LITTLE DRUMMER GIRL. During COVID, she began a virtual arts education program, designed for Native students and taught by Native professional artists, the Arts Learning Project for Native Youth. She is currently director of the Native Theatre Project, with Bag & Baggage Productions in Hillsboro, OR, dedicated to supporting storytelling sovereignty and Native leadership development.
Rachel Allen (Nez Perce) (Stage Directions)
Rachel is a Spokane-based curator and Ph.D. candidate at the University of Delaware. In her current role at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, Allen is collaborating with heather ahtone on the exhibition, Joe Feddersen: Earth, Water, Sky, slated to open in September 2024. As a curator, Allen has worked with several art museums, including the Peabody Essex Museum, in Salem, MA; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Portland Museum of Art in Maine; and most recently the Missoula Art Museum in Montana. Allen earned her M.F.A. and M.A. from Michigan State University and her B.F.A. from the Cleveland Institute of Art.
Emma Noyes (Sinixt band of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation) (Program Artist)
Emma is an artist, researcher, and educator living and working in Spokane, WA. Emma has continued the story telling traditions of her family by finding new ways to depict characters of chaptix’/coyote stories with an emphasis on coyote’s wife, mole woman. Drawing inspiration from both sides of her family, she incorporates her appreciation for Scandinavian art and design as a nod to her Danish heritage. She mainly works in brush and ink and also creates digital work. She has kept a daily journal full of illustrations for over ten years. Her book, Baby Speaks Salish (2020), was published by Scabland books and is available on the Scabland website.