Racebending.com

Carmen Moore is a veteran Vancouver film and television actress. Growing up in Coquitlam British Columbia she began acting in high school and at the Spirit Song Native Theatre Company. Over the last ten years, Moore has become a “sci-fi girl” appearing in such series as Stargate S-G1, Lost in Space, Flash Gordon, Andromeda, Wolf Lake, and in all three of SciFi Channel’s Battlestar Galactica series: Battlestar Galactica, Caprica, and Blood and Chrome.

Moore was nominated for a 2006 Leo Award for her portrayal of Simone, a bartender in Godivas. This year her portrayal of Leona Stoney in Blackstone won her the Leo for best lead female performance, and she is now up for a Gemini Award in the same category. This year has also brought her first behind-the-camera credit as one of the producers of Two Indians Talking. Moore was kind enough to give Racebending.com’s Gabrial Canada the time over the phone to discuss her diverse career.

Click here to hear the full interview or read below for an excerpt!

NOTE: The opinions espoused by the interviewees represent their viewpoints alone, and do not necessarily represent the views held by the staff of racebending.com

RACEBENDING: How important do you think is it to now be a role model yourself? Did you have the same type of positive role model on television on the screen when you were growing up, and what do you say to those people who want to be actors and actresses now?

MOORE: Well, growing up there weren’t a whole lot of First Nations people on TV. You know there was Chief Dan George. Then, of course, in the early Nineties you had Dances with Wolves come out and it was just so “in” to be Indian at that time. It’s kind of when my career took off. I was basically the only Native actor in Vancouver at that time that could play teens and early twenties. I did pretty much everything that required wearing a buckskin dress and riding bareback.

I was really lucky at that time working with little film background. I had started out in theater. There was Graham Greene, Tantoo Cardinal, Gordon Tortoosis. There were a handful of these amazing native actors I could look up to.

There are so many more getting into the business now and we are very  lucky to be showcasing some of those new actors on Blackstone. They are phenomenal talent. I feel so lucky to be working with them and to watch their careers sprouting here. To name one, Rosanne Supernault, she plays Natalie, my niece on Blackstone.

Carmen Moore in Blackstone

RACEBENDING: How important do you think it is that you have been able to do Blackstone with APTN (Aboriginal Peoples Television Network), in part? How important is it to have a network like that not just in increasing representation or in getting roles, but more importantly that they are contemporary roles? Unlike early on in your career, or even Dances With Wolves because it seems such a departure from that to something like Blackstone with is very much of the First Nations community.

MOORE:  I was so surprised when I read the first script. I thought: Wow nobody’s ever attempted to do something like this! I think APTN obviously played a pivotal role in putting the pilot out and getting the subsequent episodes.  Honestly, I don’t think any other network would have given it a chance. Then, for the first season coming out, Showcase jumped onboard and it just blew me away. We are grateful for that. We have two great networks that are behind us and that really believe in the project.

Carmen Moore with Esai Morales in Caprica.

RACEBENDING:  BSG, Caprica, and now Blood and Chrome. It’s a interesting universe. What is it about all these science fiction projects that brought you to them, because you have been in quite a few of them?

MOORE:  Over the last ten years, I think I’ve kind of become “Sci Fi Girl.” I don’t  know how that happened, actually. I think it is that they are looking for more ethnic looks on these shows, to get a sense that you don’t know where these people are from. They could be alien, they could be human. I have a look where I could kind of be anything. I guess I’ve been lucky in that sort of way.  I’ve plaid Native and Caucasian. I audition for these roles just like any other actor in the city and I guess I’m doing my job because they are hiring me.

RACEBENDING:: I think what is also interesting about your career is that you have a lot of well-rounded portrayals. For many years [that was] what you didn’t see in terms of portrayals of Native people or perhaps films that tried to generate an idea of “what a Native person was on film,” it seemed like there was almost no humor or no sexuality in what people where allowed to play, and that certainly has not been the case in your career.

MOORE:: No, not at all.

RACEBENDING: As an actress, is that something you thought you could have done a generation ago? Is it something where you believe these types of roles are going to open up?

MOORE: I’m hoping so. Blackstone is a very groundbreaking type of show. I’m hoping that opportunities open up for First Nation actors in Canada and the United States. I don’t know though. I mean, like you said, a generation ago what was I doing? I was running around in buckskin dresses. I was doing that because I needed to pay the bills and needed to build up my resume.

A generation ago what was I doing? I was running around in buckskin dresses. I was doing that because I needed to pay the bills and needed to build up my resume.

MOORE: But you know what’s funny? When I was twenty-seven, I thought: I don’t want to be that girl in the buckskin dress!” So I cut off all my hair. Suddenly, I was reading for cops and lawyers. I think that’s where it actually started. I think I was given more opportunities when I chopped off the flowing Pocahontas locks.

When I was twenty-seven, I thought: I don’t want to be that girl in the buckskin dress!” So I cut off all my hair. Suddenly, I was reading for cops and lawyers. I think that’s where it actually started. I think I was given more opportunities when I chopped off the flowing Pocahontas locks.

RACEBENDING::  One of the things I’ve asked everyone in this interview series is about the impact of media representation, and in particular the Native American Boarding Schools or Residential Schools because that is something that has had a real effect on reserve life, and I think is even the type of thing that may come up in Blackstone. I think one of the fears is that because there were so many negative portrayals of Native people that practice was allowed to continue even after so many other openly racist practices like segregation were ended. Is that something you can comment on?

MOORE:: I think Residential Schools were responsible; I think they were responsible for most of the dysfunction that is on reserves today. I certainly know survivors of Residential School or their children who are suffering the effects of having parents who are survivors  of Residential School. I am surprised when I talk to people growing up here and they still have no idea about that part  of Canada’s history.  It is just not taught here. It is sort of like Canada’s dirty little secret.

People don’t understand that these children were taken from their families, they were beaten for practicing their religion for speaking their own language, they were physically sexually and emotionally abused for their entire youth and then sent back to their reserves and just dumped their without any set of tools to survive. I mean, that is going to have an effect on any community. The community was left without children and the children were left without parents. How can these children then grow up to be good parents themselves when they didn’t have parents to learn from? We still need to address this. We do need to talk about it and understand it in order for it to change. Blackstone certainly is opening those doors.

We still need to address this. We do need to talk about it and understand it in order for it to change. Blackstone certainly is opening those doors.

 

Categories: Current Diversity Highlights, Interviews
Tags: american indian, First Nations, native american