Cliff Cardinal

Cliff Cardinalis a Canadian actor, playwright and songwriter,known for his one-man showThe Land Acknowledgement, or As You Like It.
The son of actressTantoo Cardinal, he was born on thePine Ridge Indian ReservationinSouth Dakota, and grew up in Toronto andLos Angelesas his mother pursued her career in both Canada and the United States.He had early acting roles in productions such asMichael Hollingsworth'sThe Saskatchewan Rebellionand Kenneth Williams'sThree Little Birds, and made his debut as a playwright withStitchat the 2009 Rubaboo Performance Gala inEdmonton.
In 2011,Stitchwas staged at the SummerWorks Theatre Festival,where Cardinal won theTheatre Passe MurailleEmerging Artist Award, andCara Geewon Best Actress for her performance in the lead role.
He first became widely known in 2012 for his one-man showHuff, which examined the issue of drug and solvent abuse in indigenous communities.Following a February 2016 production ofHuffbyNative Earth Performing Arts, Cardinal wonDora Mavor Moore AwardsforOutstanding New Play, Independent Theatreand Outstanding Male Performance, Independent Theatre, at the 2016 Dora Awards.
AfterHuffandStitchwere published together in book form, Cardinal was a nominee in the Alternative Format category at the 2018Indigenous Voices Awards.
In 2019 his playToo Good to Be True, inspired in part by his relationship with his mother, premiered at Toronto's VideoCabaret theatre.It was the first play ever staged by the company in its new Busy St. theatre, and one of the first times the company staged a play by anybody but Hollingsworth andDeanne Taylor.In 2019 and early 2020, he toured the variety showCliff Cardinal's CBC Special, in which he performed a mixture of short acting monologues, storytelling and music.
In 2021, Cardinal debutedShakespeare's As You Like It: A Radical Retellingat the Crow's Theatre in Toronto.Advertised as an indigenous-themed adaptation ofWilliam Shakespeare'sAs You Like It, the play actually featured no Shakespearean content at all, and instead consisted entirely of Cardinal performing a monologue on Indigenous Canadian political issues through the framework of a satiricalland acknowledgementnominally preceding the Shakespeare play that wasn't really being performed.Cardinal later explained that thebait and switchtactic was chosen because he wanted to avoid "preaching to the converted", and instead wanted the monologue to hit harder by virtue of being unexpected and surprising.To that end, he also concluded each show by asking the audience not to reveal the trick to people who had not yet seen the show.
In 2022, Cardinal undertook a national tour of the show, including runs inVancouver,EdmontonandPeterborough.Cardinal received dual Dora nominations at the 2022 awards, forBest Leading Performer, General TheatreandBest Original Play, General Theatre.The play was also published in book form, and was a shortlistedTrillium Book Awardnominee forEnglish prosein 2023.
The play received a new production byMirvish Productionsat theCAA Theatrein 2023, although it was retitledThe Land Acknowledgement, or As You Like Itas Mirvish did not permit Cardinal to use the "bait and switch" marketing tactic.
The play's print publication won theGovernor General's Award for English-language dramaat the2023 Governor General's Awards.