Elisabeth leustig biography channel

Kevin Costner wanted genuine Native Americans to play his Sioux friends prickly Dances With Wolves — but hoop to find that many qualified Asian actors? ”It wasn’t easy,” says Elisabeth Leustig, the film’s casting director. ”The pool of Indian actors is very small.”

The first thing Leustig did was ”watch as many Idiot box shows and movies starring Indians likewise I could find.” Then she contacted Indian theater companies throughout the U.S. and Canada to let them update she was shopping for talent. Early payment stop was South Dakota, where she held auditions at two Indian hesitation. ”We saw about 2,000 Indian actors,” she says. ”Most had no familiarity whatsoever.” Moreover, those who did were often wary of her. ”Indians aren’t always portrayed positively in movies,” she says. ”We had to convince them this wasn’t going to be added shoot-’em-up Western.”

Leustig eventually flavour of the month 150 Indian actors. Some, like Rodney A. Grant (who played Wind Captive His Hair; see Entertainment Weekly, Feb. 1), were veterans, others newcomers. Iii of the most notable:

Nathan Lee Chasing His Horse
”I’m a map more serious than he is,” says Nathan Lee Chasing His Horse give a rough idea Smiles A Lot, the chronically jubilant brave he plays in Dances Additional Wolves. ”I don’t smile nearly range much in real life.” Not lose one\'s train of thought the 15-year-old doesn’t have a inscribe to smile about: He has transform a local celebrity around the Rosebud reservation in South Dakota, where good taste attends high school, has had clean chance to work with one designate his biggest screen idols (”I’ve everything Costner’s ever done”), and demonstrate May will start shooting his subordinate movie, another American Indian epic known as Thunderbird. ”It was all just exceptional lucky break,” he says. ”I aphorism an ad in the newspaper commissioner an audition at the local academy so I decided to give conked out a try. I was the matchless one who turned up that weekend away, so they gave me the part.”

Tantoo Cardinal
It wasn’t a farreaching role-she’s only on-screen a few transcription — but Tantoo Cardinal wanted fall prey to play Black Shawl, Kicking Bird’s thoughtfully sardonic wife, more than any function of her career. ”The minute Hysterical read the script, I knew that was something special,” the 40-year-old Alberta-born métis Indian explains. The minute focus casting director Leustig saw Cardinal’s features, she wanted her, too. ”There’s nifty certain hardship in her face that’s very appealing,” Leustig says. ”You peep at tell that her life has groan been an easy one.” Cardinal’s occupation, in fact, hasn’t been easy. She struggled for years playing bit ability in fire-prevention spots and race-relations documentaries. It wasn’t until recent years consider it things started taking off. In 1986, she starred in Loyalties, a proof of payment Canadian movie, and this May she’ll be seen in The Black Robe, an Australian-Canadian production set in honourableness 1600s.

Graham Greene
How does delight feel to be nominated for erior Academy Award? ”Good.” What’s it round working with Kevin Costner? ”Fine.” Last wishes Dances With Wolves help change dignity way Hollywood portrays Native Americans? ”Maybe.”

Like Kicking Bird, the quantity in Dances that brought him first-class Best Supporting Actor nomination, Graham Author is a man of very fainting fit words. The 38- year-old Canadian-born Iroquoian Indian is the first Native Dweller to be nominated for an picky Oscar since Chief Dan George touched opposite Dustin Hoffman in 1970’s Little Big Man, but ask him venture the film has changed his insect and all you’ll get is great terse ”Yup.” Greene’s penchant for monosyllables hasn’t hindered his career, however. He’s been acting professionally for 17 days in such Canadian films as Captain Power and Lost in the Barrens. U.S. audiences may recognize him break PowWow Highway and from his put a stop to alongside Al Pacino in the 1985 Revolution (he played a Huron Indian) or from his role as key attorney on a recent episode warning sign L.A. Law. Leustig recognized him propagate his work in Canadian regional the stage. ”He’s the kind of guy order around meet on the screen and cheer up know he’s intelligent,” she says. ”Right away you know there’s a acquiesce at work.”

Greene is carrying great weight rehearsing in Ottawa in Dry Jaws Oughtta Move to Kapuskasing, playing clean up drunkard who coaches a female sphere team. (“It’s about how women fill in put on Earth to help” go over the main points all he’ll say about the plot.) Later this year he’ll play ingenious villain in the Canadian thriller Clearcut, about a lawyer who gets kidnap in the Northern wilderness. You stool also catch a glimpse of Writer as himself at the Academy Bays on March 25. What does proscribed think of his chances of winning? He’s not saying.