Marie Clements says making Bones of Crows felt like 'sacred work'

Q21:38Marie Clements: Why talking about residential schools in “Bones of Crows” is sacred work

Warning: This interview deals with themes of sexual assault, child abuse and intergenerational trauma.

Just one week before Marie Clements was scheduled to start shooting Bones of Crows at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, news broke that 215 unmarked graves were found at the site. And even though that tragic discovery could have stopped production entirely, it ended up giving the cast and crew a new sense of purpose and momentum.

Bones of Crows is a new five-part CBC miniseries that expands on the 2022 film of the same name. The epic tale spans 100 years and multiple generations as it dramatizes the terrible legacy of Canada's residential school system as told through the eyes of Cree matriarch, Aline Spears.

More than just a story about trauma, violence and abuse, Bones of Crows is also about resilience in the face of adversity and the quest for justice. In an interview with Q's Tom Power, Clements says every single person involved in the production had or has a relative who went to a residential school.

"We worked really hard ... to figure out an environment where performers could come to the set and feel that they were supported, and that it was a place where we're actually doing sacred work, you know, we're coming to tell the truth," Clements tells Power. "All the crew, all the creatives [and] production teams were in support of that.... It had this kind of feeling, not that we're walking on eggshells, but that we're, I don't know, we're laying ground for people to bring their talent and their heart to some very hard scenes....

"I do believe telling the truth is sacred. We're asking performers and literally everybody that worked on it for a very long shoot to bring their best, and not just for themselves as a professional, but for our families and for our ancestors."

WATCH | Official trailer for Bones of Crows:

The full interview with Marie Clements is available on our podcast, Q with Tom Power. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Interview with Marie Clements produced by Cora Nijhawan.