Reservation Dogs star D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai made a powerful statement on the red carpet for the 2024 Emmy Awards on Sunday night, pairing a classic black Armani tuxedo and jewellery by Indigenous designer Lionel Thundercloud, with a bloody red handprint smeared across his mouth.
A red hand over the mouth has become the symbol of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women movement (MMIW), which raises awareness of the Indigenous women missing and murdered across North America whose voices are not heard, according to nonprofit organization Native Hope. The organization was created to address the injustice done to Native Americans and shares Native stories, provides educational resources, and assists Native communities across North America.
The red hand over the mouth stands for “all the missing sisters whose voices are not heard,” reads the Native Hope website. “It stands for the silence of the media and law enforcement in the midst of this crisis. It stands for the oppression and subjugation of Native women who are now rising up to say #NoMoreStolenSisters.”
Woon-A-Tai has been outspoken about making Indigenous stories and issues more visible in Hollywood since the beginning of his career, so it was no surprise to see the 22-year-old Canadian actor standing in solidarity with missing and murdered Indigenous women across Canada and the US.
“I did this for those who ain’t here, not 4 me, not 4 y’all,” wrote Woon-A-Tai on his Instagram, sharing a photo from the red carpet.
In Canada, the number of Indigenous women and girls who have been killed or vanished is in the thousands. The Canadian government has reported that they are 12 times more likely to go missing or be murdered than non-Indigenous women in the country.
Woon-A-Tai, who is of Oji-Cree First Nations descent, was the first Indigenous North American to be nominated in the ceremony’s leading actor category. He was nominated for his role as Bear Smallhill in the FX series Reservation Dogs, a comedy-drama that follows the lives of four Native American teenagers living on a reservation in Oklahoma (Woon-A-Tai ultimately lost out on the award to Jeremy Allen White from The Bear). Reservation Dogs was the first American series written and directed entirely by Indigenous people and had a mostly Indigenous cast and crew. Actresses Kali Reis and Lily Gladstone also made history at this year’s Emmys, becoming the first Indigenous women to be nominated in the acting category, according to Variety.
Reservation Dogs aired its final season of the FX on Hulu series earlier this year.
