Saying the Hard Things
The Raw Honesty of Scorpio Moon
“There’s something very specific,” says Werona Swetshwelo, “about the way Montreal looks.”
Four people sit around a table when I join them, via videoconference, from my living room in Montreal. Actors Bénédicte Bélizaire and Cameron Grant play Lily and Koa respectively. They sit across the table from the play’s director, Murdoch Schon and associate director Warona Setshwaelo. We’re talking about Scorpio Moon — an immersive theatre experience, mounted as an immersive show in the unconventional converted warehouse space Studio Mile-Ex. The cast and crew is patient with me while I try to make sure my phone stays upright while typing on my ancient laptop.
Written by Montreal’s Adjani Poirier, Scorpio Moon is set in an unnamed city of low rent and high culture, where young artists have the economic space to live and create with a Utopian freedom, where an abandoned warehouse hosts a reckoning between two close friends about the aftermath of an incredible betrayal.
“It was not a stretch to relate to the characters,” Bélizaire tells me. The questions presented in the work — questions about the tension created by boundaries and intimacy, the requirements of resilient community and the need to honour ourselves — these were things she had thought about “for years.”
Cameron Grant explains that the narrative is not about an easy sort of conflict, and that in fact the work presents a narrative where, as is almost always the case in real conflict, people are not always their best selves. “It was exciting to find moments where the characters did stray,” Grant explains. “They actually say mean things, hurtful things, they bring the baggage in — you don’t know exactly whether they’ll actually work through it.”
“The play does a good job,” explains Schon, “of dealing with the fact that conflict resolution is messy as hell.”
When I ask about why this is an important message now — at this time in culture and in history — Swetshwelo elaborates that in this time of profound conflict, it’s important to stay focused on what we all have in common, as well as the skills and strategies that can actually allow for forward momentum.
“We all care about people,” she says. “[In conflict,] we advocate for our people. But we all care about people. We can get into conversations that are messy without fighting or being mean.”
“I recently had to sort out conflict with someone — the quickness with which I set that boundary,” Bélizaire explains. “I’ve not had that confidence in the past.”
Cameron, notably, is not from Montreal — and, as such, can see the uniqueness of the place in a way that maybe the rest of us have gotten too used to it to understand.
“I’ve always been inspired by the art and architecture of Montreal. There’s also just a way people look, and dress,” he explains. I’ve heard this before — the baffling beauty of the people, the effortless chic and relaxed creativity. “The people here are creative, cool, and sexy,” Cameron says.
“Montreal is a place of historically low rent,” Murdoch explains. A solemn silence settles into my living room — where I just got my seventh straight maximum rental increase notice
“And that’s all disappearing.”
Due to a combination of worldwide economic pressure, gentrification, and policy shortcomings — pushed along by the draconian economic and cultural policies of the right-wing Coalition Avenir Québec — Montreal’s arts scene, which is among the most vibrant and celebrated in the world, is under significant threat. All over the city, artists are priced out of their studios. Precious DIY venues are shuttered. Establishment spaces are not immune — with La Tulipe, an iconic Montreal venue for over a hundred years, forced to close in 2024. And while public pressure and resistance organizing has regained some ground (the Montreal Autonomous Tenant’s Union continues to assist neighbourhoods in resisting the inhumane excesses of for-profit housing), it’s easy to feel like the sun might be setting on what may well be the most unique and irreplaceable aspect of our precious city.
“How do we make our lives as artists work?” Murdoch asks. How do we build the kind of resilient bonds of creativity and love that can resist giants like exploitative capital, and fascism, and their long interpersonal shadows of loneliness and intolerance? Perhaps we can start with saying the hard things.
Presented by Imago Theatre, Scorpio Moon opens March 27th, 2025, at Studio Mile-Ex (6551 Rue Derocher) and runs through April 6th.
To purchase tickets, visit the Imago website. Pay-What-You-Decide tickets are available for every performance.
