After 30 years elevating supporting roles, theDark Windslead wants to take more risks.
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You remember Zahn McClarnons face.
Dark Winds first-season finale aired July 17, but McClarnon wont be offscreen for long.
Youve played many law-enforcement figures over the years Longmire,Reservation Dogs, and nowDark Winds.
In terms of your process, is there anything shared among these roles?Theyre all different characters.
Matthias onLongmirewas the friction between the reservation and Bob Taylor, who played Longmire.
Which is understandable, I get it.
As far asReservation Dogs, I jumped off a cliff with Big.
Bigs got a lot going on inside.
Youll see more of that in season two.
And then you go into Joe Leaphorn, which is a character with different principles and a moral compass.
He has different characteristics of people I grew up around, mainly uncles and relatives.
People I knew through ceremony in South Dakota.
But all those characters are me, obviously.
I learn my lines and give a shot to tell the truth.
I do research with making backstories.
I go into the scenes and check that I have my intentions and objectives.
I dont know any other way to put it except give a shot to be as honest as possible.
Its not a conscious thing, you know?
Its how Zahn reacts, I guess.
Being in the moment is really important for acting, and thats part of my process there.
It isnt making a lot of sense.
What does being present mean?
Listening to the other actor.
Looking at the other actor, looking and listening and seeing where they are.
Its hard, but it keeps you out of what youre doing and what youre thinking about.
Thats a part of being present.
Being part white and part Native, I always felt I didnt belong to either community.
I took a lot of those experiences and put them into Joe.
Ive certainly had personal wounds from my past that I brought.
What was the first day on set like?Theres always nervousness on the first day.
But what was great is that its pretty much a groundbreaking show.
Its great to walk onto a set and realize were getting a chance to tell our own stories.
TheyreHillermans storiesrecontextualized through a different lens.
LikeReservation Dogs, its a big family.
Everybody knows each other.
Sterlins a close friend of mine.
The writers are all close.
And withDark Winds, being No.
1 on a show and setting a certain tone on a set I took that responsibility on.
I learned from some great people.
Robert Taylor fromLongmireset a wonderful tone on set, was nice to people, welcomed the guest stars.
We look forward to doing season two.
Are these mistakes you recognized of your own volition, or are they based onfeedback you received?Both.
We had quite a time crunch.
We were green-lit and basically had six weeks to write six episodes and go into production.
A lot of things got missed.
We didnt see them at the time, and now we do.
I dont really want to go into the mistakes.
Was that something you discussed while working on season one?Yeah.
It comes down to the Native writers who wrote for the show.
It is a specific culture.
Weve got so many Indigenous tribes within the United States, and theyre all different.
All we can do is take a stab at hire the right people.
The authenticity is something we care about deeply.
Thats what we plan on doing again this year and going even further with it.
Its important that we give a shot to get those cultural aspects right.
But the thing is, were not doing a documentary.
There can be some amount of license because its a fictional TV show.Yeah.
Its hard to navigate that stuff.
Were very aware of it.
I dont think anybody can ever pass that purity test, you know?
All we can do is try the best we can and confirm we have the proper guidance.
Were going to keep striving to represent the Navajo culture in a good way.
I know thats an important phrase in Native culture.
But this is also a time when theSupreme Court is ruling against the sovereignty of Native lands.
Sobriety is a big part of my life.
We call it theChaku Luta,which is walking the red road.
And thats what Joe Leaphorn does.
Hes got these principles and this moral compass, and he walks that road.
I havent gotten into a lot of activism, but it is activism through my work.
I like how you put that.
Its a wonderful time for us Native people, having leads on television shows and hopefully changing peoples perspectives.
And we still have a long ways to go.
I hope to go into development deals where we can keep telling these stories.
Do those memories inform your work when youre playing characters of that time?Sure, sure.
I bring all of that to my work.
I want to ask you about one of those ambiguous characters: Crow Daddy inDoctor Sleep.
First, do you know how attractive people on the internet find this character?
Im content to stay away from the Reddits and Twitter and stuff, but thats wonderful.
Im glad that people think Crow Daddy was … sexy?
Incredibly hot!Thats awesome, because I dont feel incredibly hot.
Thats wonderful to hear.
I just soak it all up.
I venture to take different aspects of what theyre doing and implement it into my craft.
I learned how to have more fun and not be so intense.
And Rebecca would tease me or make me laugh.
She made me feel very, very comfortable.
She calmed me down quite a bit and helped me to listen and be in the moment.
We had a lot of fun on that set.
And they were very open to making him ambiguous.
You dont know where he comes from.
I love doing jobs like that, and I hope more come in the future, I really do.
First and foremost, Im an actor who happens to be part Native American.
It was pretty early in the morning, and we were having our coffee.
Youre soaking that in before you get to the set.
Its a 20-minute car ride, and a lot of things happen.
It certainly gets you into what Joe probably experienced every day with the vastness of being on the reservation.
You have to drive miles and miles just to get to work or a police call.
Theres a lot of driving involved.
I do hope we capture even more of the vastness of the Navajo reservation in season two.
It was overwhelmingly beautiful.Im glad you got to experience that.
Then I lived on the west side of the entrance part of the year.
We saw a grizzly bear, I cried, it was a whole thing.Thats awesome.
I grew up with those grizzlies.
