The Oscar-honored Cherokee actor returns to his home state of Oklahoma to star as one of his own ancestors in the stage production of Nanyehi — The Story of Nancy Ward.
To David Webb, who spent 10 years as executive producer for the Cherokee musical Nanyehi — The Story of Nancy Ward, actor Wes Studi’s involvement is a perfect confluence of circumstances.
“He’s going to take this show to new heights,” Webb said. “You’re getting a descendant of Nanyehi in the cast. He brings not only professionalism, but he brings real relevance. It is his genetics.”
Studi, who is and speaks Cherokee, is a native Oklahoman and a direct descendant of Ward’s. He will play the principal role of Attakullakulla, her uncle.
The musical — which will be performed on October 11 and 12 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino near Tulsa, Oklahoma — is based on the life of Ward, a Cherokee woman who was first honored as a warrior and then as a peacemaker in the 1700s.
Studi, 76, is a 2003 inductee into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum’s Hall of Great Western Performers. He has been part of several Oscar-nominated films, including Dances With Wolves, The Last of the Mohicans, The New World, and Geronimo: An American Legend.
Wes Studi in Geronimo: An American Legend
He received an honorary Oscar in 2019, when he was presented with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Governors Award honoring extraordinary distinction in lifetime achievement.
A longtime resident of Santa Fe, Studi will go home to Oklahoma and share the stage with several actors from the Tulsa area.
“It’s going to be a learning experience for many of our actors,” says Webb, who has stepped away from the production this year.
This year’s 2024 showing will be the musical’s 13th. The two-act production has been presented eight times in Oklahoma, twice in Tennessee, and in single productions in Georgia and Texas. Nanyehi is presented by Cherokee Nation Businesses and Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa.
Nanyehi was written by Nashville-based songwriter and recording artist Becky Hobbs and playwright Nick Sweet. Hobbs is a Cherokee Nation citizen who is directly descended from Nancy Ward. Hobbs first approached Studi in 2014 while Studi was being interviewed at the Oklahoma History Center Museum in Oklahoma City.
“I’m sitting out there in the audience, and I thought, Wow, he would be a great Attakullakulla.”
Afterward, Hobbs asked Studi whether he’d be in her musical.
Wes Studi for the cover story in C&I’s August/September 2019 issue (PHOTOGRAPHY: Michael Neese)
“He said, ‘Well, possibly. Does Attakullakulla have a song?’ And, I said, ‘No, he didn’t, but I’ll write you one,’” Hobbs remembers.
The collaboration didn’t emerge at that time. But, years later, when Studi learned Ward was a direct ancestor, he was in.
“We put the wheels in motion, and Cherokee Nation stepped up to the plate, and now Wes will be playing the uncle of his sixth great-grandmother,” Hobbs says. “I mean, is that not wild?”
Studi discovered more about his connection to Ward while appearing in Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s Finding Your Roots.
For Studi, returning to an Oklahoma stage is like returning to his roots. Restless as a Vietnam veteran, he bounced around seeking a career and discovered acting through community theater in the late 1970s. Stage work provided Studi with the excitement and adrenaline rush he craved.
“What I saw in community theater was you could learn your lines and do rehearsals and all of that, but finally, opening night shows up, and you’re in the wings, and I rediscovered that huge wall of fear,” he told NPR in 2018.
In 1983, he found roles in the American Indian Theatre Company of Oklahoma to satisfy pent-up feelings before heading to Hollywood.
Studi returned to eastern Oklahoma for a significant part in Sterlin Harjo’s Reservation Dogs on Hulu. Studi played Bucky in the fifth episode of Season 1 and returned throughout the show’s three-season run. The show’s premise of four Indigenous teens trying to leave Oklahoma for a more-promising life resonated with Studi.
[Left to right] Reservation Dogs: Paulina Alexis as Willie Jack, Devery Jacobs as Elora Danan Postoak, D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai as Bear, Lane Factor as Cheese (PHOTOGRAPHY: Courtesy Shane Brown/FX)
“In a way, it was what I decided to do, which was to leave Oklahoma and go to L.A. back when I was younger,” he told Tommy Orange in a GQ article in 2021.
This latest project brings him full circle. His participation will tremendously impact this year’s production of Nanyehi, Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. said in the release.
“We know that with Wes Studi’s involvement, we will have the opportunity to elevate Nanyehi’s message for peace and inspire and empower the rest of our talented cast,” Hoskin said.
