'Cuckoo' perspective

SF State student Lee A. Sprague brought his perspective on the notion of sanity and his experience as an Anishanabe Indian into his acting role as Chief Bromden in "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest."

"Being crazy, as it's defined, may be the only rational response to the craziness (of society). My ability to appear sane may be a flaw -- I have detached part of myself to where I can walk through these halls," said Sprague, who is 36 years old.

His brother Rick is auditioning for the same part in a Spokane, Washington production of the play. Rick, who escaped even times from a mental institution where he was committed, now works as an ombudsman at one, carrying out independent investigations of doctors, nurses and administrators.

The Ken Kesey novel from which the play sprang was written in the early '60s. "It was to question the dominant paradigm, and the role of the larger intrusion into Native people's lives," Sprague said.

Sprague, an Associated Students legislator, stayed out of theater for several years because he was disappointed with the parts available to him as an Indian. It was "other people's images of who we are -- we don't have control over our image," he said.

Kesey "struck a chord -- he understood the great oppressive force represented by institutions of America," Sprague said.

"The whole play asks, 'where do I stand?' America was beginning to question itself, examine the foundations, and ask, 'Are these values we can build on?' This is the history of the play when it originally ran in San Francisco," Sprague said.

In the '60s, the U.S. was engaged in termination policies aimed at absolving the government of responsibility for the Indians and abandoning all treaties. Extinction of Indian tribes and individuals was already well under way.

His character in the play is from a tribe on the Columbia River declared extinct by the U.S. government.

The Anishanabe were arbitrarily divided by the English into the Pottawatomi, Ottawa, and Chippewa, or Ojibwe tribes. The tribe's geographic origin is in "territories currently occupied by the state of Michigan," Sprague said. He'd like to think the occupation is temporary.

In the play, the six-foot-seven Chief says he is "not big enough" to stand up to those in power over him. But during the course of the play his courage and his memories return, and he returns to his right size.

The Chief tells how his father was made "little" by oppression, until he signed papers turning over his tribe's land and resources to the U.S. government. Many tribes were tricked into signing such treaties and agreements. When tribe members got checks and asked "what do we do now?" his father was too drunk and high to help them.

A scene in the play involving alcohol was very difficult for Sprague, he said. The drunken Indian is a stereotype, but there's some truth in it, he said, commenting on the problem of alcoholism in the Indian community.

"I had to make sense of it. At one point, the window's open -- I have a bottle of alcohol and I'm not leaving." Sprague said he wants to create dialogue around this. "Alcohol is a symptom of a larger problem," he said.

"The Chief understands the larger oppression, and speaks metaphorically. His father was in the way of larger forces -- what happened was not his fault," Sprague said.

Sprague remembers the words of his own father, who told him, "Be careful how you spend your words -- the value goes down." But, Sprague said of the Chief's scattered expressions, "There's no inflation rate with these words."

He commented on the misogyny in the play from the context of his own culture. "From my perspective, women are the decision-makers. Women have a better perspective on community and family."

The tribe's government is a dynamic democracy, Sprague said. "Every individual is part of it." The U.S. and SF State are representative democracies. Sprague would like to change that.

Much of Sprague's work with Associated Students involves dealing with the logistics of distributing money to student groups. But he has a lot to say about the whole system.

"We replicate power politics. Decisions are made upstairs and kicked down for rubber stamping. We (the representatives) are not given the information or the time to examine (issues)," Sprague said. These are problems of the bureaucracy, not individuals, he said.

Sprague would like to see a move away from "power politics' toward coalition government, which would involve changing the constitution. To make those changes, more students would have to vote.

Sprague is hopeful, but doesn't count on seeing these changes

during his time here. But, he said, "Even discussing the idea (of making the changes) is important -- the dialogue is important, to understand structural forces."

Sprague is an undeclared major, but said his studies are all interrelated. He is "looking toward a special major -- the impact of post and neo-colonial industrial economies on the environment and the impact on indigenous communities."

He scored second highest on a citizenship test (similar to the official INS one) in a class. Yet he is not a U.S. citizen and has never voted.

His mother is Caribbean and European, from the British colony of Trinidad, and the 'official' citizenship he holds is British. But his political and cultural identity come from his father's side.

"I grew up very ethnocentric" because of the small number in his tribe, he said. In 1970, the Anishanabe numbered 250 -- today, they are more than 400.

"Most people in the class -- many who have lived here all their lives -- flunked," he said. For him, it's all part of getting to know the enemy. "I need to understand the enemy better than he knows himself, in order to defeat him," he said.

"We're in the institution, part of it," he said of SF State. He chose to come here to find a "way to impact that structure," he said.

"When the chief leaves the institution -- where does he go? Does he get a job in a factory? I don't think so," Sprague said. This is a big question, he said, not answered in the play when the Chief escapes. Sprague likes to think the Chief would do some of the things he and his friends are involved in now.

Sprague has participated in U.N. activities in New York and locally. He has also been very active in planning events for Indigenous People's Day, which will be celebrated in Berkeley on Saturday, Oct. 7 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Martin Luther King, Jr. Park, between Center Street and Allston Way.

[ Golden Gater Online October 5, 1995 ]

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