Article content

RIVIERE DU LOUP — Jean-François Lisée celebrated “a victory for free speech” Wednesday after learning that a production of the controversial play Kanata will be staged in France this fall.

Quebec director Robert Lepage, who will direct the play, announced he would abandon the project this summer after protesters decried his use of white actors to play Indigenous characters.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Quebec election: Lisée lauds 'victory' for controversial play Kanata Back to video

The protesters included survivors of Canada’s residential school system and Indigenous people taken from their parents during the Sixties Scoop.

During a campaign stop in eastern Quebec Wednesday, Parti Québécois chief Lisée implied that those protesters were censoring Lepage’s freedom of expression. In fact, it was the play’s producers pulling their funding of the play that led to its demise.

“People who said the play cannot exist (were the censors),” said Lisée. “Some of those protesters, people on social media.”