Irene Bedard (born July 22, 1967) is an American actress, who has played mostly lead Native American roles in a variety of films. She is perhaps best known for the role of Suzy Song in the 1998 film ''

Smoke Signals The smoke signal is one of the oldest forms of long-distance communication. It is a form of visual communication used over a long distance. In general smoke signals are used to transmit news, signal danger, or to gather people to a common area ...

'', an adaptation of a

Sherman Alexie Sherman Joseph Alexie Jr. (born October 7, 1966) is a Spokane- Coeur d'Alene-Native American novelist, short story writer, poet, screenwriter, and filmmaker. His writings draw on his experiences as an Indigenous American with ancestry from se ...

collection of short stories, as well as for providing the speaking voice for the titular character in the 1995 animated film ''

Pocahontas Pocahontas (, ; born Amonute, known as Matoaka, 1596 – March 1617) was a Native American woman, belonging to the Powhatan people, notable for her association with the colonial settlement at Jamestown, Virginia. She was the daughter of ...

''. Bedard reprised her role as Pocahontas in the films direct-to-video follow-up, '' Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World'' (1998) and for a cameo in ''

Ralph Breaks the Internet ''Ralph Breaks the Internet'' is a 2018 American computer-animated comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The 57th animated film produced by the studio and the sequel to ...

'' (2018).

Early life

Bedard was born in

Anchorage, Alaska Anchorage () is the largest city in the U.S. state of Alaska by population. With a population of 291,247 in 2020, it contains nearly 40% of the state's population. The Anchorage metropolitan area, which includes Anchorage and the neighboring Ma ...

and is of

Iñupiat The Iñupiat (or Inupiat, Iñupiaq or Inupiaq;) are a group of Alaska Natives, whose traditional territory roughly spans northeast from Norton Sound on the Bering Sea to the northernmost part of the Canada–United States border. Their current ...

and French Canadian/

Cree The Cree ( cr, néhinaw, script=Latn, , etc.; french: link=no, Cri) are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada ...

(

Métis The Métis ( ; Canadian ) are Indigenous peoples who inhabit Canada's three Prairie Provinces, as well as parts of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, and the Northern United States. They have a shared history and culture which derives ...

) heritage and an enrolled member of the Native Village of Koyuk in Alaska. Bedard graduated from

Dimond High School A. J. Dimond High School (DHS) is a public four-year high school in Anchorage, Alaska, and is a part of the Anchorage School District. It has been accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. Dimond serves students in the ...

in Anchorage, Alaska in 1985. Bedard attended The University of the Arts in

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

where she studied musical theater.

Career

In 1994, Bedard appeared in her first role as

Mary Crow Dog Mary Brave Bird, also known as Mary Brave Woman Olguin and Mary Crow Dog (September 26, 1954 – February 14, 2013) was a Sicangu Lakota writer and activist who was a member of the American Indian Movement during the 1970s and participated in some ...

in the television production of '' Lakota Woman: Siege at Wounded Knee'', which depicted the 1970s standoff between the US government and citizens of several Native nations, including many of the Pine Ridge Reservation, at Wounded Knee,

South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...

. For this role, she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Miniseries or Television Film. She is probably best known as the voice of the eponymous heroine in the 1995

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

animated film ''

'', the direct-to-video 1998 sequel '' Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World'' and in the 2018 film ''

''. She appeared in a different take of the story in Terence Malick's 2005 film ''

The New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...

'', as Pocahontas's mother, Nonoma Winanuske Matatiske. In 1995, Bedard was chosen as one of ''

People A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...

'' magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People". In 2001, Irene Bedard hosted the Ninth Annual

First Americans in the Arts First Americans in the Arts (FAITA) is a non-profit organization based in Beverly Hills, California. According to its website, the organization was created "to recognize, honor and promote" Native Americans in the United States Native Ame ...

(FAITA) Awards from the Beverly Hilton Hotel. In 2002, at the Tenth Annual FAITA Awards, Bedard won Outstanding Guest Performance by an Actress in a TV Drama Series for '' The Agency.'' In 2005, she was cast in the television mini-series '' Into the West'' as Margaret "Light Shines" Wheeler. Bedard has been very active in environmental groups to protect sacred lands. In 1997, she co-hosted with

Floyd Westerman Floyd Westerman, also known as ''Kanghi Duta'' ("Red Crow" in Dakota) (August 17, 1936 – December 13, 2007), was a Dakota Sioux musician, political activist, and actor. After establishing a career as a country music singer, later in his life ...

a benefit for the Dine' People of Big Mountain at The Loft Theatre, in Pasadena. In 2015, she appeared in Chloé Zhao's debut feature film, ''

Songs My Brothers Taught Me ''Songs My Brothers Taught Me'' is a 2015 American independent coming-of-age Native American drama tragedy film written and directed by Chloé Zhao in her feature film directorial debut, and produced by Zhao and Forest Whitaker. Developed at ...

''. In 2016, Bedard announced an agreement with the

Catawba Catawba may refer to: *Catawba people, a Native American tribe in the Carolinas *Catawba language, a language in the Catawban languages family *Catawban languages Botany *Catalpa, a genus of trees, based on the name used by the Catawba and other N ...

Nation of South Carolina to join in a production agreement. In 2017, she appeared as a recurring character in the TV series '' The Mist''. Bedard made an appearance in the music video for Jay-Z's 2017 song "

Family Feud ''Family Feud'' is an American television game show created by Mark Goodson. It features two families who compete to name the most popular answers to survey questions in order to win cash and prizes. The show has had three separate runs, the ...

". In 2020, Bedard played a recurring character in seasons one and two of the drama series '' FBI: Most Wanted''. She then was a starring cast member in the Paramount+ miniseries ''

The Stand ''The Stand'' is a post-apocalyptic dark fantasy novel written by American author Stephen King and first published in 1978 by Doubleday. The plot centers on a deadly pandemic of weaponized influenza and its aftermath, in which the few survivin ...

,'' as Ray Brentner, a gender-swapped version of Ralph Brentner from the 1994 adaptation. In 2022, she was cast as Yagoda in the upcoming Netflix series ''Avatar: The Last Airbender'' and as Sylvie Nanmac in '' Alaska Daily'', the mother of a missing indigenous woman.

Personal life

In 1993, Bedard married musician Deni Wilson. Between her films, the pair toured for several years with other musicians in a band called "ID," which came from the initials of their first names, Irene and Deni. In 2012, the couple divorced following Bedard's allegations of being a spousal abuse victim. In November 2020, Bedard was arrested twice in three days. The first arrest was for alleged domestic violence, assault, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and criminal damaging; the second was for alleged disorderly conduct. On August 20, 2022, she was again arrested for drunken disorderly conduct after she was heard loudly arguing with another woman in the street with no regard of safety in Xenia, Ohio. Bedard claims she was locked out of her studio and had no alcohol in her system, but police detected alcohol on her breath. The incident had begun as a welfare check on the other woman, who was reported as being passed out in the bushes, but she was gone when authorities arrived, leaving Bedard at the scene.

Filmography

Film

Television

Music video

Video games

Awards and nominations

References

External links

''Irene Bedard Biography''
at ''who2.com'' * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bedard, Irene 1967 births 20th-century American actresses 20th-century Native Americans 21st-century American actresses 21st-century Native Americans Actresses from Anchorage, Alaska American film actresses American people of Métis descent American television actresses American voice actresses Cree people Inuit actresses Inupiat people Living people Native American actresses Native American actors University of the Arts (Philadelphia) alumni 20th-century Native American women 21st-century Native American women