Poorly sewn seeds reap law suits

What differentiates this true story’s protagonist from any other? As we are told early on, “he didn’t cave.” In Seeds, a documentary play being performed at the Monument-National Theatre, a farmer from Saskatchewan takes on a multi-national corporate farming giant.

The play is based upon a story that has been unfolding in the Canadian media and court system for roughly six years. As it has progressed, the case has produced a hero for grassroots activists the world over.

The action begins in Bruno, SK where Percy Schmeiser, a husband and canola farmer on the verge of retirement, was first taken to court by GMO giant Monsanto. The accusation he faced was that he had illegally acquired and used a gene which the company had patented. Schmeiser would lose this case, but as is made evident in Seeds, the battle had only begun.

Indeed, the main focus of the play is not on the lawsuit itself, but rather on its aftermath and implications. As playwright and artistic director Annabel Soutar explained, “this play is really about the dirt behind the case.” Unfortunately, in such a high-stakes situation, dirt was pretty hard to dig up.

Thus, the Schmeiser v. Monsanto case became in Soutar’s words “an exercise in investigative journalism.” She went to Saskatchewan, and collected original court documents, statements from friends and acquaintances of Schmeiser’s, and local news coverage of the case. The result is an inspiring, if rather slow, documentary play.

Most of the inspirational value though, comes from the actual story and not so much from its portrayal on stage. However, if the production seems more like a compilation of newscasts than anything else, it may be because the case received so little attention from the real media. Seeds therefore is primarily an effort to provoke thought and awareness, rather than to entertain.

Certainly Schmeiser’s story could have been spun into a riveting narrative “based on a true story.” Instead, the play consists entirely of primary documents spoken by six actors, each actor playing multiple roles. The first act therefore consists almost entirely of courtroom transcripts from the 1998 lawsuit, which Soutar explained she “had to edit down from 1300 pages to the 20 meatiest.” The second act is a post-modern collage of court documents, interviews, letters, telephone conversations, newspaper articles and editorials, and public speeches.

As Schmeiser has become one of the most vocal spokespersons of the anti-GMO movement, he has been traveling around the world speaking out on modern farming practices, corporate bullying and scare-tactics. Excerpts from speeches given in Texas and India testify to his near-superstar status in the agricultural and environmental communities. But in all the madness that the case has swept up, it is clear that the truth has been completely lost from sight.

Schmeiser’s appeal reached the Supreme Court of Canada, where the original decision was upheld, though it was decided that he did not owe Monsanto the vast sums of money he’d been ordered to pay originally. But for all this time in court nobody is any closer to knowing how the patented gene ended up in Shmeiser’s field. At the other end of the spectrum, we do not leave the theatre with any definite opinion as to whether or not a company should be allowed to patent a life form. One does leave with the clear and uncomfortable knowledge that we exist, as is articulated in a courtroom transcript, within “a system which seeks to commodify everything.”

And so the bitter question remains... "who owns life?"

Note: This article was originally published on 14 November 2005 in the McGill Daily and can also be found on that paper's website here.