Murielle Borst-Tarrant’s “Tipi Tales from the Stoop”

Murielle Borst-Tarrant (Kuna/Rappahannock) is an author, playwright, director, producer, cultural artist, educator, and human rights activist. Author of the fantasy series The Star Medicine, she studied at HB STUDIOS in New York City, with Spiderwoman Theater, and is a graduate of Long Island University. She works on the deconstructing of methods of the arts in Native communities in urban areas across the country, Canada, and in the New York City education system. She also consults with many urban and non-urban universities on the development of Native theater programming.

Nominated for the Rockefeller grant in 2001, Borst-Tarrant won a Native Heart Award and was the only Native American Woman to be selected by the Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia at the Sydney Opera House for her one-woman show, More than Feathers and Beads. She served as the Special Assistant and Liaison to Tonya Gonnella Frichner, the North American Regional Representative to the United Nations’ Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, and as Chairwoman for the Woman’s Caucus for North America from 2013 to May 2014.

Borst-Tarrant directed Muriel Miguel, founder of Spiderwoman Theater in Red Mother nationally and internationally, and was the Keynote Speaker for the Indigenous Women’s Symposium at Trent University. She was recently selected to speak on “Repetition, Tradition and Change: Native oral history and contemporary art practice in hostel post-colonial times” at the International Conference at the Muthesius Academy of Art in Kiel, Germany and the Norwegian Theater Academy. Named in American Theater Magazine as one of the most influential women in American Theater, Borst-Tarrant is the Artistic Director of Safe Harbor Indigenous Collective and consultant for La MaMa Experimental Theatre Indigenous Initiative. She produced, wrote, and directed Don’t Feed the Indians—A Divine Comedy Pageant! at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (2017).

Named by American Theater Magazine as one of the Most Influential Women in American Theater, Borst-Tarrant is the Artistic Director of Safe Harbor Indigenous Collective. She is a 2020 recipient of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation National Playwright Residency Program.

Tipi Tales from the Stoop is the intoxicating tale of Murielle Borst-Tarrant’s life as a child, an actress, mother, & New Yorker. Named after her mother the infamous downtown lesbian theater icon Muriel Miguel of Spiderwoman Theater. She expresses her upbringing in a mafia run neighborhood in Brooklyn. Being raised by her grandmother of a different time while navigating her parents activist-driven & dysfunctional marriage. She talks about being raised in the rehearsal rooms, theater wings, & even having a stint on her own PBS children’s show in the 70s. She talks about her family’s historical trauma and how it has manifested in their “famous” family brownstone in Red Hook, Brooklyn. She tackles her inner child’s rage and how her family will be able to heal for future generations.

Tipi Tales From the Stoop workshop performances were presented in November, 2024 at LaMaMa in NYC. It will receive its world premiere at the Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC) Wed-Sat, Jan 8-12, 2025.