It was the day that a grand showdown in “Prey” was going to be shot, and Amber Midthunder was feeling terrible.
She was sick and had lost her voice. The sequence featured the film’s most physically intense action, requiring refined choreography and a rousing ending. And overall, you want to be your best when you’re up against an intergalactic nemesis who traveled to Earth to hunt humans for sport.
“I really wanted to do it! So I haven’t talked to anyone all day,” Midthunder said. “And then we were like, ‘We’ll just try it and see what happens.'”
The nerves of steel paid off. On Friday, “Prey,” directed by Dan Trachtenberg, premieres on Hulu with another reimagining of the “Predator” action series set in the early 18th century that doubles as a coming-of-age adventure . Midthunder plays Naru, a young Comanche woman who must prove herself to a tribe that underestimates her.
But there’s no underestimating the 25-year-old actor taking on the kind of starring role that isn’t always achievable in Hollywood. A member of the Fort Peck Sioux tribe, she is the rare Native American female action leader, headlining a franchise that originally rested on the pumped-up shoulders of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Making deadly jumps, throwing axes with precision, and delivering well-timed one-liners, Midthunder fits most definitions of “action hero.”
Not that she feels that way, not yet.
“I feel like an Amber,” she said kindly in an interview at a Midtown Manhattan hotel last week. Still, the actor – a bright and poised presence in a sunny vermilion dress – acknowledged that “Prey” is part of an action-friendly resume.
Midthunder broke through with her role in “Legion” (2017-19), the hallucinogenic “X-Men” TV spin-off starring Dan Stevens, Jean Smart and Aubrey Plaza. Midthunder’s character shared a body with a scientist, played by Bill Irwin. Rather than be confusing, her experience with the show has “solidified” her as an actor, she said, along with a small but inspirational role in the 2016 Texas heist drama “Hell or High Water.” These experiences energized her after an earlier stint in a Nickelodeon-esque series didn’t suit her. (Although she didn’t mention the title, it sounded a bit like “The Misadventures of Psyche & Me.”)
Her film and television work seems to be a triathlete’s preparation for the challenges of ‘Prey’. She was a regular on the science fiction series “Roswell, New Mexico” and played a fearless truck driver opposite Liam Neeson in “The Ice Road,” a long-distance Netflix thriller set on thin ice. She also starred in and co-produced a Bruises indie four-hander about two couples, “The Wheel.”
Her peers’ reviews suggest an already seasoned performer. A definite fan, Irwin wrote in an email to the Times that their dual role was “the easiest collaboration I think I’ve ever been part of.” Neeson sent a succinct but clear thumbs up: “An outstanding young actress with a certain energy that stands out.”
Midthunder’s career started with a strong family base. Her father, David Midthunder, is a regular on screen (“Westworld”, “Dark Winds”). She remembers visiting him on the set of productions such as ‘Comanche Moon’, a prequel to ‘Lonesome Dove’. He met her mother – the casting director and former actress Angelique Midthunder, who was from Thailand – while they were starring in the same film.
Born on the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico, Amber Midthunder grew up primarily in Santa Fe with residences in California and Florida. She remembers hanging out in her mother’s office after school and watching actors come and go from her comfortable seat.
“I had a Disney princess tent with an air mattress in the bottom for my eighth birthday,” she recalls. “I was supposed to do my homework, but I raised my head and gave my opinion.”
Midthunder’s father tried to provide some perspective on the barrage of images of Native Americans presented by mainstream culture. An enrolled member of the Fort Peck Sioux, he spent much of his childhood on the reservation. His own father worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, helping tribesmen with paperwork.
“My father was very intentional to show me how, traditionally, Indigenous people have been portrayed in the media,” she said.
“Prey” features a largely Native American cast — including an impressive first-timer, Dakota Beavers, as Naru’s brother — and a producer, Jhane Myers, who is Comanche and Blackfeet and advised the production extensively. These representation and authenticity efforts hit Midthunder.
“Often in historical pieces we are reduced to a hyper-spiritualized figure or this violent wild caricature,” she said. “It touches you if you hardly ever see someone who resembles or represents you. That does something to your psyche, where you ask yourself, ‘Oh, aren’t we good enough? Or is that really how people see us?’”
“Prey” is one of a number of recent productions that feature Native American actors, most notably the critically acclaimed show “Reservation Dogs”.
“It’s a richer, more diverse scene for Indigenous artists,” said Joanna Hearne, a professor at the University of Oklahoma who specializes in Native American and global Indigenous film and media studies. “What we’re seeing, along with an increase in Indigenous performers on television, is also more opportunities for these kinds of roles in genre films in the studio.” She considers the lead role of Midthunder in a studio film something rare.
Still, the artist Zahn McClarnon, who is of Lakota and Irish descent, said, “We now have more opportunities as Indigenous actors and actresses than before.” McClarnon, the star of the AMC limited series “Dark Winds,” who also appeared in “Reservation Dogs,” noted that “many major networks and production companies and movie studios wouldn’t risk hiring a lead actor.”
(The original “Predator” casting confirms the protagonist’s longstanding Hollywood dynamic: Sonny Landham, a Seminole and Cherokee actor, played one of the ill-fated elite squad members led by the indomitable Schwarzenegger.)
In addition to the lead role of Midthunder, “Prey” stands out for its use of language. The film will be streamed not only in its original English, with some Comanche and French, but also in a full Comanche version, dubbed by the cast members. (French is spoken by a group of grungy trappers who play a prominent and brutal role in the plot.)
But even before “Prey” premieres, Midthunder’s career momentum shows no signs of stopping: She’s reportedly cast in “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” a live-action series on Netflix. When asked if she could say anything about the series, Midthunder chuckled and said, “Nothing I can talk about right now.”
She saw parallels between her aspiring warrior in “Prey” and her own rise as a star. (“The metaphors are endless!”) But if she felt any pressure at all, she kept a cool head.
“I’ve tried not to think about that,” she said. “When you get there and you do the work, you know, everything just goes away.”
