Tantoo Cardinal facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Tantoo Cardinal CM
Cardinal in 2022
Born	Rose Marie Cardinal (1950-07-20) July 20, 1950 (age 74) Anzac, Alberta, Canada
Nationality	Canada
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1975–present
Children	3, including Cliff Cardinal

Rose Marie "Tantoo" Cardinal CM (born July 20, 1950) is a Canadian actress. Of Cree and Métis heritage, in 2009 she was made a member of the Order of Canada "for her contributions to the growth and development of Aboriginal performing arts in Canada, as a screen and stage actress, and as a founding member of the Saskatchewan Native Theatre Company."

Early life

Rose Marie "Tantoo" Cardinal was born the youngest of three children to Julia Cardinal, a woman of Cree and Métis descent, and a white father.

Cardinal was raised in the hamlet of Anzac, Alberta. The lack of electricity inspired her to use her imagination while playing in the bush. Her grandmother nicknamed her "Tantoo" after the insect repellent they used while picking blueberries together. She taught Cardinal the Cree language, the traditional ways of their culture and the difficulties she would face growing up Métis in Canada. Cardinal has said that it was walking behind her grandmother where she first learned to act.

Career

Cardinal in 2001

Cardinal has played roles in many notable films and television series, including Spirit Bay, Loyalties, Dances with Wolves, Black Robe, Legends of the Fall, Smoke Signals, Hold the Dark and North of 60. She was cast in the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation mini-series By Way of the Stars with Gordon Tootoosis as the Cree Chief and Eric Schweig as Black Thunder.

In 2009, she was made a member of the Order of Canada "for her contributions to the growth and development of Aboriginal performing arts in Canada, as a screen and stage actress, and as a founding member of the Saskatchewan Native Theatre Company".

Cardinal's Hand print on the Aboriginal Walk of Honour in Canada

On August 23, 2011, Cardinal, Margot Kidder, and dozens of others were arrested while protesting the proposed extension of the Keystone Pipeline.

In 2012, Cardinal portrayed Regan in an all-aboriginal production of William Shakespeare's King Lear at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, alongside a cast that also included August Schellenberg as Lear, Billy Merasty as Gloucester, Jani Lauzon in a dual role as Cordelia and the Fool, and Craig Lauzon as Kent.

She played Marilyn Yarlott for three seasons as a recurring cast member in the Netflix series Longmire, a Crow hunter and medicine woman who lives alone in the vast wilderness of the Crow reservation.

In 2017 she was named the winner of the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television's Earle Grey Award for lifetime achievement. She has also won a Gemini Award, a National Aboriginal Achievement Award (now Indspire Award) and was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame.

In the 2018 film The Grizzlies, she plays a high school principal who is skeptical that a first-time teacher can address social issues in the northwestern Nunavut community of Kugluktuk.

On November 26, 2021, Cardinal and several other laureates received the Governor General's Performing Arts Awards after a nearly two-year delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Personal life

Cardinal met her first husband, Fred Martin, while boarding at his family's home during her high school years in Edmonton. They were married from 1968 to 1978 and had a son, Cheyenne, prior to their divorce.

She had her second son, Clifford, with Beaver Richards.

From 1988 to 2000, Cardinal was married to actor John Lawlor, with whom she had a daughter, Riel.

Filmography

Key

Denotes works that have not yet been released

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1978	Marie-Anne	Tantou
1981	Death Hunt	Indian Woman
1983	Running Brave	Caroline
1986	Places Not Our Own	Rose
	Loyalties	Rosanne Ladouceur	Nominated - Genie Award for Best Actress
1987	Candy Mountain	Annie
1988	War Party	Sonny's mother
1990	Divided Loyalties	Molly Brant
	Dances with Wolves	Black Shawl
1991	Black Robe	Chomina's Wife
1993	Silent Tongue	Silent Tongue
	Where the Rivers Flow North	Bangor
	Mustard Bath	Sister Amantha
1994	Sioux City	Dawn Rainfeather
	Legends of the Fall	Pet
1997	Education of Little Tree, TheThe Education of Little Tree	Granma
	Silence	Dolores
1998	Honey Moccasin	Honey Moccasin
	Smoke Signals	Arlene Joseph
	Heartwood	Violet Boucher
1999	Hi-Line, TheThe Hi-Line	Singing Bird
	Stranger in the Kingdom, AA Stranger in the Kingdom	Heaven Fontaine
2000	Postmark Paradise	Reenie
	Blood River	Claire / Mattie	Short
2002	Edge of Madness	Ruth
2004	Memory	Ida	Short
2006	Unnatural & Accidental	Aunt Shadie / Rita
2008	Older than America	Auntie Apple
	Ancestor Eyes	Verna	Short
	Mothers & Daughters	Celine
2010	Every Emotion Costs	Aunt Marcy
2011	Shouting Secrets	June
2012	Eden	The Nurse
2013	From Above	Older Venus
	Maïna	Tekahera
2014	Down Here	Stella Mitchell
2015	Hope Bridge	Lana
2016	ARQ	The Pope
2017	Wind River	Alice Crowheart
2018	Falls Around Her	Mary Birchbark
	The Grizzlies	Janice
	Through Black Spruce	Mary-Lou
	Hold the Dark	Illanaq
	Angelique's Isle	Thunderbird Woman
2019	Red Snow	Ruth
2020	The Corruption of Divine Providence	Juniper Fairweather
2022	Wendell & Wild	Miss Hunter (voice)
	The Last Manhunt	Ticup
2023	Killers of the Flower Moon	Lizzie Q	Nominated – Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture
2025	Wildwood	Carol Grod (voice)	In production

Television

Audiobooks

Music videos

See also

In Spanish: Tantoo Cardinal para niños

• Notable Aboriginal people of Canada