The American press says that “Hollywood loves stories that almost fail.” Lily Gladstone, Oscar-nominated actress, was living with her parents during the pandemic and was determined to work on something that would keep her isolated so as not to catch Covid-19 when she received the call from Martin Scorsese for The Moon Killers ( Killers of the Flower Moon).
“'Give up' is a big word! It's more that I was giving up on the idea of settling in New York or Los Angeles, trying to find meetings. I just wanted to take a really long break and do the things that mattered to me: At the time, I was helping care for my immunocompromised father and my elderly grandmother, who has since passed away. She was terrified of bringing Covid-19 home. I thought I'd gather some data from the Department of Agriculture to fight the 'giant murder hornets', as they were rudely called. I have a deep love for bees. So, I thought, 'Oh, a nice secluded job that keeps me outdoors and that I can come and go from…'” said she, who became the first Native American to be nominated for an Oscar for best actress.
Since the premiere of The Assassins of the Moon, this last year has become the one that has received the most offers. “I have almost 600 unread texts at the moment.” Gladstone, 37, has blood from the Siksikaitsitapi and Niimi'iipu ethnic groups. In Scorsese's film she is Mollie Burkhart, a woman from the Osage Nation, part of a family attacked for their rights to oil-rich lands.
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But before the call of film legend, she had planned to continue with indie films. She “she was waiting for several incredible independent filmmakers. I knew that Erica Tremblay had been writing Fancy Dance for me, for example. I was waiting to see if Erica's script would get the green light. But it's hard for a native queer writer, director, and woman to finance her films! So, you know, acting is a very difficult profession, and I guess I was becoming very honest with myself about doing other things or choosing something that would be a seasonal job.”
“You are constantly a role model”
As she has said in speeches prior to the Oscars, Lily Gladstone feels like she carries a weight on her shoulders and is interested in living up to what is expected of her. “Given the community I come from and the structure of what is expected at each stage of life, you are constantly a role model for the generation that comes after you. I've always operated in this space of 'is someone watching what I'm doing'. You behave a certain way when you know your younger cousins are watching what you do! So any pressure feels immense when we're talking about a movie like The Moon Killers. But that's the gift of being part of a larger community, not just my family, not just my tribal nations, but all of it, everyone. We love to see ours succeed. I don't feel like it's all for me or all about me. It's about all the kids I've had the opportunity to train theater with. I also felt like it was something I was sharing with them, you know?”
She has also said that she feels surrounded by the Osage. “For the community leaders. And then all the Osage ladies too. “I have overwhelming support.” In fact, she enrolled in classes to study the language because she wanted to take the character “in the right direction,” as if it were her family. “I knew I had to carry Mollie like I would expect someone to carry my great-grandmother, Lily. She was born in 1896. Mollie was born in 1886. I was born in 1986, so she was kind of a nice little trifecta. Lily was a traditional woman and also a very devoutly Catholic woman. I grew up as her namesake, the only girl in my large family. I was raised to bear her name, so I knew I would carry her with the preciousness that I would expect someone to carry Lily with,” she highlighted.
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