How Lily Gladstone's nomination could impact future Oscars, Native American representation
For the first time in Oscars history, a Native American woman has been nominated for "Best Actress," setting up a potentially historic night in Hollywood on Sunday, that could impact the future of the award show.
Lily Gladstone has made this Oscar season more memorable by her grace.
Gladstone used the language of the Blackfeet to accept her Golden Globe award before making history when she was nominated for an Oscar as "Best Actress" for her role in 'Killers of the Flower Moon.'
"Being the first Native American nominee for this kind of blows my mind," Gladstone said.
'Killers of the Flower Moon' depicts the way the Osage people were exploited and even killed, so greedy and ruthless men could secure the oil beneath their lands.
The movie was always conceived as an epic, but director Martin Scorsese had the original script rewritten to focus it on Gladstone's character.
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Molly Burhart's marriage is disastrous and then deadly.
"The story that happened to her and her family is important," Gladstone said. "It's correcting a huge historical injustice to telling the story. It feels pretty immense to be a part of all it."
It's all the more remarkable when you consider the way Native Americans were shown on the big screen for most of Hollywood's history.
"I mean, you think about how Native Americans and people of color were portrayed in silent films from 'Birth of a Nation' to so many, just really terrible and racist depictions," said Vanity Fair writer Chris Murphy.
Now the hope is the film's 10 Oscar nominations are not simply a quirk of fate.
"We're creating a dialogue. That's all we wanted to do was create a dialogue about these issues, and we feel like that's happening," said 'Killers of the Flower Moon' actor William Belleau.
Belleau's career is definitely happening. He's part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as one of the actors in the limited series 'Echo.'
He told Eyewitness News entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon that watching Martin Scorsese direct Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio and all of the other actors were like "paid film school," and made him feel that he can tell his own stories now.
