Lily Gladstone made history as the first Native actor to win Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Drama, at the 81st Golden Globe Awards for her role as Mollie Burkhart in Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Gladstone, who uses she/they pronouns as a way to decolonize gender, first acknowledged the award with words in Blackfeet and Osage languages.
“Oki niksookoowaiks, niitaaniikoo Piitaki, mahtohtoh Siksikaitsitapii
“Niisakakoomiim”
Translated by Dr. Karla Bird, tribal outreach specialist at the University of Montana, for TODAY.com, Gladstone said: “Hello, all my relations. My name is Eagle Woman. I am Blackfeet. I love you!”
Osage Nation Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear sat at Scorsese’s table at the Golden Globes and watched her historic achievement, which has brought jubilation from Indian Country.
“To get Lily as the first [award for Killers of the Flower Moon], I was just excited and happy. Lily delivered … she had that crowd. They are all standing behind her, and I saw it with my own eyes. Of course, you want to win everything, and there are other award shows coming up,” he said, referencing the Oscars. Standing Bear noted he is attending the Governor’s Awards (Jan. 9), “which is another step in the direction of the Oscars,” he said.
Gladstone spoke expressively in Blackfeet, before switching to English, translating the last line: “I love everyone in this room right now.” She went on to speak about the racist manner in which Native languages have historically been portrayed in Hollywood films, and Standing Bear added that after she uttered those words—”Native actors used to speak their lines in English, and then sound mixers would run them backwards to accomplish Native languages on camera,”—those sitting behind him moaned in disapproval of industry history.
Gladstone dedicated the Golden Globe to Native children who have not seen accurate Indigenous representation and acknowledged the historic nature of the win. “It doesn’t belong to just me,” she said. “I’m holding it right now, I’m holding it with all my beautiful sisters in the film at this table over here, standing on all of their shoulders,” she said, acknowledging Tantoo Cardinal, Cara Jade Myers, JaNae Collins and Jillion Dion who portrayed Mollie Kyle Burkhart’s mother and sisters in the film.
Gladstone acknowledged their mother’s work in helping to get the Blackfeet language into schools, even though their mother is not Blackfeet. They also shared that their nation encouraged them, “to keep going, to keep doing this.” She also thanked Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro for being allies and changing the state of Native representation in Hollywood. She also thanked Chief Standing Bear, the Osage Nation and the Wahzhazhe people.
The Osage community and community at large watched the Globes remotely at a watch party hosted by the Osage News at the Pawhuska Osage Casino and Hotel. Tommy Schultz, Chickasaw, attended with his wife and said playing outlaw Blackie Thompson was his first experience acting whatsoever, but auditioning had been a bucket list item, and he plans to further his career.
Osage/Kaw actress Desirée Storm Brave, who played Bertha Bigheart, addressed the attendees of the watch party after Emcee and stylist John Parker invited her to speak: “Hawe, zhazhe wida chemi^o^pa^mi. Wewina.” Brave is the Kaw Language Department Director, and acknowledged the impact of Wahzhazhe ie being spoken in the feature film.
Others pictured who attended the watch party and were also featured in the film included Chay Nicholas, who portrayed many characters as a background actor; Margaret Sisk, who played the Pipe Keepers Wife in the opening scene of the film, also served as a consultant to the non-Osage Indigenous actresses. Grayhorse elder Dolores “DeeDee” Goodeagle played a rich Osage woman in the street dance scene and said she was impressed by Gladstone’s portrayal of Mollie Burkhart, which mirrored what she’d witnessed firsthand of Osage women in her youth. Her sister Beverly Brownfield agreed and said, “She acted just like the women in those days.”
Goodeagle and Brownfield were dressed up for the occasion, and Goodeagle wore a designer dress featuring Osage pins by NyiK’omi Kennetha Greenwood. She was joined by her daughter Candace Toehay, and Brownfield attended with her daughter Lynette Freeman, who starred in several different roles in the film as well. The table was partially donned in rhinestones, reflecting the sparkly tone of the event which featured eleven sequined outfits and many more in shimmering and sparkling tones.
Angela Pratt and her husband Edward Gray Sr. played a fleeing Osage family with their children in the film, and after Gladstone’s award was announced, Pratt cried tears of joy. Crying was a response many Indigenous people shared in responding to the film on social media.
Pratt said she was emotional because she knew the film would help to educate people, and fight racism in the Osage reservation where contemporary Native people are still erased.
“We are in Oklahoma in our own home,” Pratt said, “and we are Indigenous in perpetuity, and to act like we’re not here … They just really glaze over us. There are 39 tribes in Oklahoma alone … and we get people looking at our children with true disgust for having long hair … It’s almost intentional, to just erase us out of their minds. So, I am grateful for things like this.”
Other Osages expressed discomfort with the white lens and point of view leading the film. Actress Jojo Horsechief said, “We needed more Mollie.” Her friend Jenna Makes Good, a beader who wore earrings of her own making, nodded in agreement. Still, other Osages felt the white perspective of narration framing the film’s tragic events was a critical component in addressing the most racist attitudes of Oklahomans who have been denied accurate education of the history of the state.
Schultz, who intends to do more work in films representing Native people, is open to opportunities led by already-visible white allies such as Scorsese and DiCaprio, as well as those by Natives working to tell their own stories. Yancey Red Corn and sister Moira RedCorn are working with Yancey’s son Miles on a script to dramatize the work of their late father Charles H. Red Corn’s book, “A Pipe for February.”
Osage Linda “Gayle” Carter from Collinsville attended the event and is one of many Osages who wants to share her family’s own story, but doesn’t have a platform to do so. Her story is similar to that of those portrayed in KOTFM. “My grandfather was killed in 1923 under mysterious circumstances, but his death was never investigated. My mother was 6 years old when her daddy was killed,” she said.
“I’m really happy that this history is being validated on a large scale,” said another Osage. “Many times, Native people are silenced.” An Osage elder sitting at the same table commented that what stood out to her about the event was the wide range of ages of those in attendance, all of whom she saw engaged and joyful.
Janese Lasley, mother of former Osage Nation Princess Gigi Sieke, expressed the film is helping non-Osages to understand triggers one commonly experiences as an Osage. “My grandpa’s generation and my dad’s generation only talked about [the murders] in whispers … My daughter’s generation is vocal. They’re going to be the ones that heal us.”
Osage language teacher and cook Dana Daylight portrayed Anna Sanford in the film and she and her daughter Robynn Rulo also prepared Osage food featured in the film. Of portraying Sanford’s death, Daylight said, “It was dark … but a great deal of prayer went into the film.” Daylight prayed with other Osages on set not only at the re-opening of buildings where known murders took place, but also for the food cooked in the film to bless everyone, and the actors who worked to tell the story.
Emcee John Parker, son of Daylight, a descendant of Henry Roan along with his mother, and an actor and stylist kept everyone in positive spirits as he asked trivia questions, awarded door prizes, and acknowledged the Osage sentiment, “even if we don’t win, we’ve already won.”
Gladstone’s Acceptance Speech:
“I love everyone in this room right now, thank you. I don’t have words. I just spoke a bit of Blackfeet language, the beautiful community nation that raised me, that encouraged me to keep going, keep doing this. To my mom, who even though she’s not Blackfeet worked tirelessly to get our language into our classroom, so I had a Blackfeet language teacher growing up.
“… I’m so grateful that I can speak even a little bit of my language, which I’m not fluent enough here, because in this business Native actors used to speak their lines in English and then the sound mixers would run them backwards to accomplish Native languages on camera. This is an historic one. It doesn’t belong to just me. I’m holding it right now, I’m holding it with all my beautiful sisters in the film and my mother [in the film], Tantoo Cardinal. Standing on all of your shoulders.
“… Thank you, thank you Marty, thank you Leo, thank you Bob. You are all changing things. Thank you for being such allies. Thank you, Eric [Roth, the co-screenwriter], thank you Chief Standing Bear … and a big’ole Way-we-nah [“deeply grateful” in the Osage language] to the Wahzhazhe, Osage Nation.
“… This is for every little rez kid, every little urban kid, every little Native kid out there who has a dream, who is seeing themselves represented and our stories told by ourselves in our own words with tremendous allies and tremendous trust with and from each other. Thank you all so much.”
