‘It’s the Kind of Story That Could Take Place Everywhere’

Lily Gladstone will star in The Memory Police, a story she believes is affecting because it “could take place everywhere.” During a Sunday screening of Killers of the Flower Moon in Los Angeles – Gladstone, to the surprise of many, was not nominated for a BAFTA and was not present at the awards ceremony – she discussed the significance of the upcoming film (via Deadline), sharing:

“It’s the kind of story that could take place everywhere. I think anybody who comes from a world culture or a history where there’s been a systematic effort to erase your sense of who you are, your memories, your language, your culture – in this film, birds are disappeared because they’re deemed unnecessary.”

According to the film’s synopsis, The Memory Police takes place on an unnamed island where things have begun to disappear. However, a rare few are able to remember all that no longer exists, but the Memory Police are determined to make sure that what has been erased remains forgotten forever. Discussing the film’s plot, Gladstone said:

The Memory Police is directed by Reed Morano (The Handmaid’s Tale). The upcoming film will reunite Gladstone with her Killers of the Flower Moon director, Martin Scorsese, who will serve as an executive producer. The Memory Police is adapted by Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich) from the novel of the same name by Yoko Ogawa.

“The adaptation is done by Charlie Kaufman, so it’s labelled as a sci-fi, but in the way that ‘Eternal Sunshine’ and ‘Synecdoche, New York’ was a sci-fi. It happens very much in the subconscious mind and deals with, of course, themes of memory, authoritarianism,” Gladstone said.

Lily Gladstone Makes History with Killers of the Flower Moon Role

Although Gladstone has been acting professionally for over a decade, she is best known for her work on Scorsese’s 2023 crime epic Killers of the Flower Moon. She recently made history as the first Native American to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama and be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Upon receiving the Oscar nod, Gladstone questioned why it had taken this long for an Indigenous North American to earn a nomination:

“Why am I the first? Why did it have to take this long for me to be the first Indigenous North American? Most of the films that show up in these categories are shot on Indigenous land in North America, and it’s taken this long.”

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Gladstone has received consistent praise for portraying Mollie Kyle (later Burkhart) in Killers of the Flower Moon, a real Osage woman who becomes wealthy after oil is found on Osage land. She is among the favorites to win the Oscar statuette for Best Actress, alongside Emma Stone (Poor Things) and Sandra Hüller (Anatomy of a Fall). Gladstone is also a frontrunner in the Screen Actors Guild Awards race for Best Actress – the ceremony will air on February 24 on Netflix.

Including Gladstone’s nomination, Killers of the Flower Moon is up for 10 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for Scorsese, and Best Supporting Actor for Robert De Niro (notably absent is DiCaprio for Best Actor, which many have deemed a snub).

Killers of the Flower Moon

Release Date

October 20, 2023

Director

Martin Scorsese

Runtime

3hr 26min

Studio

Appian Way, Apple Studios, Apple TV+