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Presented in conjunction with LA SKINS FEST, this panel of Native American actors will focus on the importance of accurate representation in media and the damage caused by misrepresentation. The panelists will also provide insight into how they broke into acting, maintain a career, and build on success within the industry.

About the panelists:

MorningStar Angeline is a queer Navajo, Chippewa Cree, Blackfoot, and Latinx New Mexico–based actress, director, producer, writer, and performer. She has acted in features such as Drunktown's Finest, Keyhole Garden, and The Incredible 25th Year of Mitzi Bearclaw, and television programs including YellowstoneChambers, and Longmire. In 2020, she was selected as a Vision Maker Media Short Film Fellow for Seeds and a Native American Feature Film Fellow for her script, Rowdy by Nature. Morningstar is a 2018 Sundance Indigenous Lab Fellow and was honored by the New Mexico Film and TV Hall of Fame the same year. Most recently, she was cast in the Amazon series, Outer Range, and assisted director Zack Snyder on Army of the Dead.

Originally from Texas, Cherokee Sheri Foster Blake was honored with a Best Supporting Actress award from First Americans in the Arts for acting in Oliver Stone’s U-Turn. Other film appearances include Naturally NativeSecondhand Heart, and Mohawk, and TV performances include House, Crazy Horse, and Coyote Waits. For her role in The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Blake was the first Native American to be considered for an Emmy. She has also served on the board of directors of the American Indian Registry and was a founding Trustee of The First American in the Arts.

Born in Berlin, Germany, Kiowa Gordon’s early life was spent on the Hualapai Reservation, learning his mother’s culture with his seven siblings. Everything changed in late 2008, when he was approached by Stephenie Meyer to audition for the second film in the adaptation of her book series, The Twilight Saga. Kiowa has gone on to work in film and television ever since, winning the Best Supporting Actor award at the 2013 American Indian Film Festival for his role in The Lesser Blessed, appearing with Jason Momoa and Tom Sizemore in The Red Road TV series and co-starring in the horror film Blood Quantum.

Martin Sensmeier is best known for his roles in The Magnificent SevenWind RiverYellowstone, and Westworld. The actor, producer, and model is part of the Tlingit and Koyukon/Athabaskan tribes of Alaska. He was raised in a Tlingit coastal community in Southeast Alaska and grew up learning and participating in the traditions of his people, while carrying on the native subsistence lifestyle that has been sustained for thousands of years.

Kapena Baptista (moderator) is a composer, ethnomusicologist, and indigenous advocate. After graduating from Harvard in 2016, Kapena was named an inaugural Generation-Indigenous Fellow through the Center for Native American Youth and was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study and teach in Lisbon, Portugal. Baptista is an MFA candidate in the Peter Stark Producing Program at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, where he is both a Norman Topping Graduate Fellow and a Shriram Family Graduate Fellow. 

Presented by the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Outside the Box (Office), Our Voices, USC Visions and Voices: The Arts and Humanities Initiative, and the LA SKINS FEST.

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