Some are calling it ‘Sex and the City’- Mohawk Style. ‘Mohawk Girls is a half hour series set on the Kahnawake Reserve in Quebec. The series has been commissioned for two seasons and will air this fall in English/Mandarin on OMNI television, and English/Mohawk on APTN.
According to the official statement by Rezolution pictures, ‘Mohawk Girls follows four Mohawk women; Bailey, Caitlin, Anna and Zoe as they try to figure out what it means to be a modern-day Mohawk woman.
The show is directed by Tracey Deer, 35, Mohawk Bear clan from Kahnawake. It is based on her documentary of the same name, which follows the experiences of some of Kahnawake’s teen girls.
“All those four characters are really four sides of my own personality,”says Deer. “I really dug into my own personal experience and built the show around that and what I know.”
Mohawk Girls takes a brave step into non-native living rooms with an unapologetic presentation of the modern Mohawk woman and ‘rez life.’ During the show’s pilot episode one character discovers the person she is dating is her second cousin, a hilarious yet horrible revelation known to Ongwehowe women across the board. That kind of brash and sassy delivery of Ongwehowe truth peels back the veil of life on the rez, and is sure to make this show a hit with native and non native audiences alike.
Deer told the Two Row Times, “I think our non-native audience is going to get an education. They need to start learning about us on another level. All too often they hear about indigenous people in the big traumatic/dramatic stories that happen in the news. We’re still dealing with a lot of hard issues, but we’re also people. We have our every day issues of love and relationships and family like everybody else. I think if Canadians can start to see us in that way it’s going to start to bridge the gap between us, at least that is my hope and it’s one of the goals of the show.”
Although the show will be distinctly native, itwill tackle the major issues facing any woman on the journey of self-discovery. “I feel like the subjects of culture, identity and belonging are universal themes. I think that all people from all communities will be able to relate to those struggles,” said Deer.
Mohawk Girls stars Jenny Pudavick, Heather White, Maika Harper, and BrittanyLeBorgne; all Ongwehowe actors who bring a wealth of experience and talent to the screen. It will be filmed on location in Kahnawake and Montreal throughout the spring.
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