Marie Clements is a renowned Canadian Métis playwright, performer, director, producer, and screenwriter born on January 10, 1962. She studied journalism at Mount Royal College in Calgary, Alberta, and later worked as a radio news reporter during the 1980s.
As a writer, Clements has worked across various mediums, including film, television, radio, and live performance. Her plays typically explore themes such as racism, sexism, and violence, blending Aboriginal storytelling, ritual, and Western theatrical conventions. This unique style often reframes authorized Western histories to acknowledge alternative narratives.
In 2001, Clements founded the Urban Ink Production Society, an Indigenous and multi-cultural theatre company, where she served as artistic director and produced over a dozen new works for the mainstage. Her play Burning Vision toured nationally and was nominated for the 2002 Governor General Award.
Clements went on to found Working Pajama Lab in 2010, a company specializing in story creation and development across film, television, digital media, and live performance. The same year, she was commissioned to create the Aboriginal Pavilion's closing performance at Vancouver's 2010 Winter Olympic Games, leading to the creation of red diva projects, a production company focused on Indigenous films, live performance, and multi-media works.
Her inaugural production, a short film version of the closing performance titled The Road Forward, won several awards, including Best Music Video at the American Indian Film Festival and the audience award for Best in Show at the Native American Film & Video Festival of the Southeast. Clements' The Edward Curtis Project received a 2013 PuSh Festival award and eight additional nominations, as well as an Ottawa's Circle Award.
Clements has also found success through her self-titled Marie Clements Media production company. The feature-length version of The Road Forward premiered at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, opened the 2017 DOXA Documentary Film Festival, and closed the 2018 ImagineNATIVE Film Festival. It received several accolades, including five Leo Awards, an AIFF Best Director Award, and a Writer's Guild nomination for Best Documentary Screenplay.
Her war drama film, Red Snow, received widespread recognition, including the Audience Award for Most Popular Canadian Film at the 2019 Vancouver International Film Festival. The project garnered 10 Leo Award nominations and won awards at the Edmonton International Film Festival, the L.A. Skins Festival, and AIFF. Clements was also nominated for a Directors Guild of Canada Best Director Award for her work on the film.
Throughout her career, Clements has held various residencies, including playwright in residence at the National Theatre School of Canada, the Banff Centre for the Arts, the Firehall Arts Centre, and the National Arts Centre. She has also been writer-in-residence at several Canadian universities, including Simon Fraser University and University of British Columbia.
The Theatre Research in Canada journal has dedicated a special issue in celebration of Clements's contribution to Canadian theatre. She has received numerous awards, including the 2018 WFF Women on Top Award and WIFTTV Spotlight Impact Award, and the 2019 Telefilm Canada Birks Diamond Tribute to Women In Film.
