Don't feed the trolls. Write an award-winning play about them instead

The new class of Canadian theatre-makers might be stuck at home like the rest of us, but the COVID-19 crisis won't stop them from doing what they love. So when the pandemic struck, the National Theatre School launched Art Apart. Its mission: support projects by emerging artists. Some 100 applicants from across the country have already received a $750 grant from Art Apart. And now, their shows are ready for an audience. Every week, CBC Arts will put the spotlight on one of these original works.

Artist: Monica Ogden

Homebase: Victoria

Project: Monica vs. The Internet: Tales of a Social Justice Warrior

The exact flavours of "haterade" will vary: misogyny, racism, conspiracy theories and straight-up harassment. But let's just say it: YouTube comments are the worst.

So, what's a content creator to do? Feed the trolls? Ignore them? Or, like, Monica Ogden, do you write an award-winning play?

The show is Monica vs. The Internet: Tales of a Social Justice Warrior, and with the support of Art Apart, a pre-taped performance will be broadcast on Zoom June 12.

As for the story, it starts in 2015, when Ogden — then a gender studies major at the University of Victoria — jumped into vlogging, posting lessons on things like consent and privilege through her series, Fistful of Feminism. An influencer, she is not (to date, she has about 500 subscribers), but the troll army went on the attack, and the show is her dispatch from the comment thread.

But this isn't her tale alone. As Ogden makes sense of the situation and what it means to be a Filipinx feminist activist on YouTube, she shares the stories of her Lilang (grandmother) and mom, and how systemic racism impacted their lives in Canada. 

Starring Ogden, and directed and co-created by K.P. Dennis, the show played six cities across the country in 2019. The upcoming Zoom production was recorded at that year's Vancouver Fringe Festival, but to bring the show's discussion of race, activism and identity into the here and now, it'll be followed by a live "talkback" event about making theatre as BIPOC creators. Featuring Ogden and Dennis, the free event will be taking donations for the Black in B.C. Community Support Fund for COVID-19.

Ogden revealed more about their plans while sharing the play's origin story.

You've been working on this project for years, right? When did you begin?

Yeah, we started in 2017, which is when I asked [director and co-creator] K.P.. Dennis to come on board, and we did a workshop performance in Victoria, B.C., at the Fringe. That was a very different show, but we also faced a lot of backlash and racism in my hometown. We won an award at that Fringe [Pick of the Fringe: Bravest Show], which helped us with the future of the project.

When we returned to the city this year with a different show, and we still did the Fringe, we received even more racism than the last time. 

What do you mean by that? What happened?

There's a lot of things that went on, but in this particular case there was a racist review and this was absolutely not new to us (laughs). We've received multiple racist reviews, but it was very indicative of what happens when artists of colour speak to power.

From what I gather, the play itself was informed by hateful, troll-ish comments you were getting on YouTube. How has backlash fueled the show? 

Yeah, absolutely. A big theme of the show is me as a young person turning to YouTube because theatre was so racist, and I didn't have a space there — which ended up being a horrible decision because YouTube is so racist — and then I had to come back to the theatre to make the show. So...(laughs)

It's kind of like it doesn't matter where you go, racism is everywhere. It's part of our lives. We're implicated in it. 

The show is about my experience as a Filipino YouTuber, and all of the things that culminated in why I turned to the internet and YouTube. So, it outlines the history of the Filipino women in my life and how they came to the lands in which we occupy now, uninvited. And it talks about what it is to be an activist in this day and age when the internet is so full of hatred and racism. 

And not only that, but what it means to be someone like me — who has privilege, who is mixed race, has light skin — and what my role is in taking on systems of oppression like anti-Blackness and anti-Indigeneity, which are things that I don't face, but my director and co-creator faces. 

It really is a show about family and about intergenerational wisdom and trauma. But ultimately, the message that I try to get across is that we all have a part to play in undoing white supremacy. 

You mentioned it's a very different show than it was in 2017. What changed?

Yeah. It's always kind of reflective of the time that it's set in. So in 2017 there was a lot of different internet references that were happening at the time. It was a little bit less about my family. 

The heart of the show is really about the women who raised me, the Filipino women in my life, and how I get to have the privilege to share their stories on stage and that's how I contribute to our family. I can use my platform and my privilege to undo the white supremacy that they experienced all their lives.

This show, we're actually doing an archival performance. It was filmed in Vancouver during the Fringe festival there. That's kind of why we added a live talkback [after the show]. We can talk about right now and what's going on. There's so much happening right now, especially for the Black community, that needs to be talked about. We'll be using that platform very specifically and strategically to be eliciting donations for Black communities in B.C.

Obviously, people don't have to give money if they don't have it. They're coming into a free space. But we're gonna try as best we can to remind people that action doesn't just look like sharing a couple things online.

What had you originally planned to be doing this spring?

The show was scheduled to be in the 2020 Revolver Festival in Vancouver. That was going to be at the end of May. All of our gigs that we had lined up for the near future are all gone. So it's affected us in a huge financial way. 

But also for me as a disabled artist, I'm immunocompromised — in a lot of ways it's also benefited me by having to stay home. I've been able to take care of my body and look after myself and put my focus as much as I can into what I can do from home. 

It does feel limiting, a lot. It's really hard not to be in the community, because our show is very much about who comes — you know, Filipino families who come to see themselves reflected a little bit, BIPOC community members who are just looking to connect with us. So that's really, really hard. It's a bit of a positive and a negative.

When we're on the other side of this, do you think your approach to theatre might be different?

Probably (laughs). At the beginning I was like, "You know what? I'm done. I don't want to do theatre!"

I think that was more an exhaustion reaction because I was finally able to rest. But you know, as more time passes, storytelling is so important. It's the reason why I've continued after so many bad things have happened (laughs). And I do miss it. There's a lot of things I don't miss about theatre. There's a lot of things that I think need to change, and need to like go away forever — and a lot of that is addressed in the show. But I do have a better understanding of how difficult it is to produce online.

And I have a deeper appreciation for disabled artists like myself. They've always been working to make things that are accessible for them, and they've paved the way for all of us. Zoom access, this online stuff: it's what they've been doing forever, you know. So I have a deep appreciation for those artists. 

This conversation has been edited and condensed.

Follow Monica vs. The Internet on Facebook and watch the show live on Zoom. (Update: The performance has been rescheduled to Friday, June 12 at, 8:30 p.m. ET.) 

CBC Arts understands that this is an incredibly difficult time for artists and arts organizations across this country. We will do our best to provide valuable information, share inspiring stories of communities rising up and make us all feel as (virtually) connected as possible as we get through this together. If there's something you think we should be talking about, let us know by emailing us at cbcarts@cbc.ca. See more of our COVID-related coverage here.