Regina actor to shine in Spielberg mini-series

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Tracking down Mathew Strongeagle is pretty hard.

Then again, when you're a high school student at Scott Collegiate and you're moving to a new home and helping to celebrate your parents' anniversary, and you're acting in three different television shows in two provinces, you're a hard guy to pin down.

During the month of October, the 18-year-old member of Key First Nation was probably the busiest actor in Canada. He stars in one television show, Moccasin Flats, filmed a guest appearance on another show, renegadepress.com, and jetted from Regina to Calgary to film his role as a young Sioux man in a television mini-series.

And not just any mini-series. Into the West, filmed on the Stoney First Nation outside of Calgary, has an executive producer you've probably heard of-Steven Spielberg.

"This gets more fun every time I get another job," he said in an interview.

"I've done so many of these interviews, I don't know what to say any more," he joked.

The acting bug bit Strongeagle six years ago when he had appeared as an extra on the television show Dead Man's Gun. The Strongeagles were living in Vancouverr where the show was being filmed.

"I had a girlfriend and her grandmother knew an agent who was looking for Aboriginal actors. I did a little interview and I was an extra on Dead Man's Gun," he said. "My mother, my niece and I were extras on the show."

In Regina a few years later, Strongeagle's father received a phone call from a family friend, Earl Kinistino, an actor and writer. A film company was making a television show based in Regina's inner city, and Kinistino urged Strongeagle to try out for the part.

In the show, Moccasin Flats, Strongeagle plays Matthew Merasty. The character started out as the best friend of the main character, but as the show evolved he's become a main character as well. Next season, the Merasty character will play a central role as a music producer.

"I audition other rappers and this guy, Oz, comes in and I start producing his music," Strongeagle said.

Moccasin Flats is one of the brightest spots in Saskatchewan's rapidly growing television industry. The critically acclaimed show, which is broadcast on APTN, is set in North Central Regina and features a mostly Aboriginal cast and crew.

"That was great. I'm proud to be associated with that," Strongeagle said. "Not many of our people are associated with this kind of work. I'm proud of living and working in North Central, and maybe opening doors to the young ones ... all the kids look up to me. They know who I am. After this, I hope this opens doors for them."

On renegadepress.com, Strongeagle plays a gang member-the first time, he said, he's ever played a bad guy.

"It's kind of a Degrassi High kind of thing," Strongeagle said. "There's a bunch of youth going to school and dealing with problems like drugs and gangs. It's a great set."

Renegadepress.com is slated to be broadcast on APTN this spring.

His role on Into the West, he said, was his biggest surprise. In the first of a projected five episodes, Strongeagle plays Running Fox, the younger brother of a man who grows up to be the medicine man for the Lakota people.

This historical mini-series covers important events in the life of an Aboriginal family and a non-Aboriginal family in the American west in the 19th century.

"On the first day of filming it was cold. There was hoarfrost on the grass, there was fog, and you're in your breechcloth and leggings. It was crazy," he said.

"We had to film a fight scene. We had no rehearsals and no padding. I had to drag this guy off a horse and wrestle around with him. We did four takes. They loved it."

Into The West is scheduled for broadcast on the American cable network Turner Network Television sometime next year. The show is produced by DreamWorks Television. It's not known if or when the mini-series will be shown on Canadian television.

After five days of filming in the Calgary area Strongeagle went home to learn that renegadepress.com's producers wanted to bring him back into the show.

"I thought they were done with it, but after Into the West, my agent got a letter from them saying that they wanted to have me in another episode," he said. "The more work, the better."

What does the future hold for the young actor? He wants to get his Grade 12, and after that, his future looks wide open.

"Other than the hurry-up-and-wait around the set when you're waiting for filming to start, I love acting," he said. "I love being able to meet a lot of new people/ You get to go everywhere and it's a challenge.

"Whatever happens, after I'm done school, I'm there, man."