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Actor Shelley Niro

Popularity:

Age: 71 (1954-01-01)

From: Niagara Falls, New York, USA

Biography:

Shelley Niro is a multi-disciplinary artist, and a member of the Six Nations Reserve, Turtle Clan, Bay of Quinte Mohawk. She has worked in a variety of media, including beadwork, painting, photography, and film. Her work challenges stereotypical images of Indigenous Peoples.

Most Known for...

The Incredible 25th Year of Mitzi Bearclaw 2019 ( 4)

As MITZI BEARCLAW turns 25 years-old, she is faced with a tragic decision – stay in the big city to pursue her dream of designing hats or leave her boyfriend and return home to her isolated reserve to help care for her sick mother. Loyal to her family, Mitzi reluctantly returns to Owl Island to find that not much has changed. Her confidence and modern style clash with the sleepy, slow-paced island; the bullies are the same; the handsome HONEYBOY is still running the water taxi; and ANNABELLE, Mitzi’s mother is still as bitter and unloving as ever. She’s also reunited with her spiritual friends, FAITH, HOPE, and CHARITY who guide her as she navigates a year of anger, loss and love. Mitzi is soon surprised to find comfort in being home and starts to question her destiny.

Honey Moccasin 1998 ( 4)

This all-Native production, by director Shelley Niro (Mohawk), is part of the Smoke Signals new wave of films that examine Native identity in the 1990’s. Set on the Grand Pine Indian Reservation, aka “Reservation X”, HONEY MOCCASIN combines elements of melodrama, performance art, cable access, and ‘whodunit’ to question conventions of ethnic and sexual identity as well as film narrative. A comedy/thriller complete with a fashion show and torchy musical numbers, this witty film employs a surreal pastiche of styles to depict the rivalry between bars The Smokin’ Moccasin and The Inukshuk Cafe, the saga of closeted drag queen/powwow clothing thief Zachary John, and the travails of crusading investigator Honey Moccasin. This irreverent reappropriation of familiar narrative strategies serves as a provocative spring-board for an investigation of authenticity, cultural identity, and the articulation of modern Native American experience in cinematic language and pop culture.

Café Daughter 2023

In a small Saskatchewan town in the 1960s, Yvette Wong, a young girl of Chinese and Cree heritage, struggles with her Indigenous identity amidst family tragedy in this coming-of-age film directed by Mohawk artist and filmmaker Shelley Niro. Yvette’s mother, Katherine, discourages her from embracing her Cree identity, so she explores it in secret. As she learns more about herself and her Indigenous heritage, Yvette finds a friend in Maggie Wolf, who embraces being part Mi’kmaq and encourages Yvette to be proud of being Cree. When her classmates learn about her Cree ancestry, Yvette encounters the realities of being Indigenous, facing prejudice with pride and holding fast to her dream of becoming a doctor. Café Daughter is inspired by true events and based on Kenneth T. Williams’ play of the same name.