Tomson Highway, CM (born 6 December 1951) is a Canadian and Cree playwright, novelist, and children's author. He is best known for his plays The Rez Sisters and Dry Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskasing, both of which won him the Dora Mavor Moore Award and the Floyd S. Chalmers Award.Highway has also published a novel, Kiss of the Fur Queen (1998), which is based on the events that led to his brother René Highway’s death of AIDS. He also has the distinction of being the librettist of the first Cree language opera, The Journey or Pimooteewin.
He was awarded the C.M. (Member of the Order of Canada) on October 27, 1993 for his services to Canadian Native Heritage.
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Was the eleventh of twelve children, five boys and seven girls. Only six of the eleven are alive today.
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Was Artistic Director at Native Earth Performing Arts, Toronto for over 5 years.
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Spent two years at the University of Manitoba Faculty of Music studying piano, which he had picked up at the age of thirteen. Then studied to be a concert pianist under William Aide in London, England. Returned to the University of Manitoba after a year. The next year he went to the University of Western Ontario and graduated with a Bachelor of Music in May 1975. He stayed another year to complete English courses required for a Bachelor of Arts degree.
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Sent to a Roman Catholic residential school at the age of six. He stayed there until age fifteen.
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Graduated from Churchill Highschool in Winnipeg, where he stayed with a number of white foster families,in 1970.
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For the first six years of his life he lived a traditional nomadic lifestyle in the remote forests and lakes of northwestern Manitoba.
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Father, Joe Highway, was a trapper and fisherman, and a legendary dog-sled racer.
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Cree was the only language spoken among his family, and he only became fluent in English in his teens.
Writer
Title
Year
Status
Character
Symposium: Ladder of Love
1996
Documentary
Self
Title
Year
Status
Character
Life and Times
1997
TV Series documentary
Himself
Tomson Highway: Thank You for the Love You Gave
1997
Documentary
Symposium: Ladder of Love
1996
Documentary
Himself
Known for movies
Symposium: Ladder of Love (1996) as Writer
Tomson Highway: Thank You for the Love You Gave (1997) as Actor
$18 Million
