Felix Clary
ICT + Tulsa World
OWASSO, Okla. — In an effort to bolster Native representation in the film industry, Amazon is partnering with the Cherokee Nation to fund the tribe’s new film institute.
The Cherokee Film Institute is the first tribally operated education and workforce development center that aims to make it easier for Cherokee and Native people to enter the entertainment industry.
Amazon Vice President of Public Policy and Community Engagement Brian Huseman visited the Cherokee Film Studio in Owasso on Tuesday to celebrate the partnership.
“I’m honored to announce a partnership with the Cherokee Film Institute that will allow the inaugural class of 25 Cherokee and Native American students to attend the institute — tuition free — starting in January 2025,” Huseman said.
Amazon’s partnership with the institute is meant to encourage more TV shows and movies to be filmed on the Cherokee reservation.
“Amazon has made a choice to help elevate the voices that for too long have been marginalized in this country. Voices that for too long have been often a caricature in the entertainment industry,” Cherokee Nation Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. said.
Hoskin said Cherokee youth “can’t be what they can’t see.” He hopes the institute will give Cherokee people interested in film the opportunity to achieve their goals at home on the reservation and will allow Cherokee youth to see more representation not only on the big screen but behind the scenes.
“They need an opportunity to see themselves as part of this industry,” Hoskin said. “Because if this century is going to be a great Cherokee century, we need our people coming home, staying home, and finding out that they can do anything they want.”
Husemen gave an example of the type of film he hopes will come out of the partnership with Cherokee Film.
He discussed the 2025 release of the Amazon MGM Studios film “Sarah’s Oil” that saw “34 production days in Oklahoma.” Huseman said the film is about the “richest Black girl in America,” who was from the Cherokee reservation in the early 1900s. Cherokee Film Commissions did a casting call for the film that had an Oklahoma budget of over $18 million and employed 124 resident crew members, he said.
“Amazon is grateful to the state of Oklahoma for its continued investments to support film and television production, and to the Cherokee Nation for its investments to make Oklahoma a diverse, vibrant and competitive filming location,” Huseman said.
Oklahoma Lt. Gov. Matt Pinnell said at the event that this is not just a Cherokee Nation Film Institute, calling it “Oklahoma’s film institute.”
“This is a message that I’m delivering all across 77 counties, across 49 other states: This institution will be on par with the Georgia Film Academy and any other film academy in this country,” Pinnell said.
The Cherokee Film Studio has been involved in more than 200 productions since 2014, he said. In fiscal years 2023-24, Pinnell said, the studio helped produce 32 films and TV shows, “generating more than $153 million in local spending in Oklahoma.”
He said the institution also represents a larger movement toward “narrative sovereignty,” which he described as a “cutting-edge venture to remove barriers for Native Americans and Oklahomans who aspire to join the film and media industry.”
“Cherokee Film Institute will just help ensure that Native Americans are not only represented in media, but also driving their own stories, reclaiming their narratives in a meaningful and powerful way, and we are just honored to again be a part of that,” Pinnell said.
Applications opened in early September, according to a news release Tuesday, but the Cherokee Film Institute’s inaugural class of students has not yet been selected.
