The movie Lily Gladstone watches “more than any other”
After giving a truly remarkable performance in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon as Mollie Kyle, a wealthy but exploited Osage woman who survived the Osage murders, Lily Gladstone emerged as one of the most significant names in contemporary cinema, becoming the first Native American to receive a nomination for the ‘Best Actress’ Academy Award.
Gladstone had already given a series of impressive efforts in a wide range of films, including Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women and First Cow, as well as Jimmy P: Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian, but it was her effort in Scorsese’s historical drama that saw her arrived on the big stage.
When Gladstone named her six favourite movies of all time in a feature with A-Frame, several of the works mentioned had a relation to Native and Indigenous people, and the actor signed off her list with a glowing discussion of the 1974 black comedy western film Blazing Saddles, directed by Mel Brooks.
“I probably watched [it] more than any other movie in my childhood,” Gladstone said. “I think before I even realized it, Blazing Saddles defined the Western for me, and I love that it was a satire of the Western and that it was done in such a diverse way.”
She added: “It was having conversations nobody was having, but in a way that was so accessible because it was so funny! It was just a perfect little indictment of Americana.”
Starring Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little, the postmodernist satirical film focuses on the antics of a black sheriff in the fictional town of Rock Ridge who tries to bring it into a state of law and order. However, the inhabitants of Rock Ridge try to drive the sheriff out, and Brooks tackles the nature of racism and the tropes of the Western film genre with his usual comedic wit.
Going on to express her love for the film, Gladstone noted: “I remember being a kid, and you thought Mel Brooks was a Native guy. Even though it was technically redface, it’s like this shared history that Black and Indigenous people have with Westward Expansion and this shared acknowledgement and humor.”
“I loved that,” the actor signed off. “We’re at a point where we’re seeing Westerns crop up again, and we’re seeing people wanting to be this John Wayne cowboy. And I don’t know if the idolization of these characters ever went away, but Blazing Saddles just deconstructs all of that in such a delightful way.”
Check out the trailer for Blazing Saddles below.
