‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Puts New Indigenous Stars on the Map

livemint.com:

When Martin Scorsese set out to make “Killers of the Flower Moon," a film based on a true story about a series of murders targeting the Osage community in the 1920s, the director needed to cast 63 credited Native American roles. So his team called casting director Rene Haynes, who’s spent the last three decades finding Native American talent for film and television projects. For “Killers of the Flower Moon," she worked with Scorsese’s longtime casting director Ellen Lewis to find actors to play the plethora of Native parts.

“This is something special," Haynes said. “The fanfare that this project is getting, the level of A-list talent. I think that we are in a renaissance of indigenous projects and we are all very hopeful." There has been a recent boom in high-profile projects centering Native American actors.

The FX television show “Reservation Dogs" on Hulu recently finished an acclaimed three-season run telling the stories of a group of Oklahoma teens. On AMC there’s “Dark Winds," a show about Navajo police officers in the 1970s. The 2022 movie “Prey," an outgrowth of the “Predator" franchise, featured Comanche protagonists.

Many of these projects have been hailed for their commitment to telling indigenous stories—and for using indigenous performers, too. Behind the scenes, there is a cottage industry of specialists in the casting business like Haynes who focus on finding Native American talent. “I feel like when I first started it was pretty much just period pieces-slash-westerns, and most of the time, Native American characters were antagonists," said Angelique Midthunder, the casting director behind “Reservation Dogs" as well as “Rez Ball," a coming film about a Navajo high school basketball team produced by LeBron