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Sacheen Littlefeather lied about being Native American, sisters claim-Tori Brazier-Entertainment – Metro
Rosalind Cruz and Trudy Orlandi said they were speaking to clear their father’s name.
Littlefeather was an ‘ethnic fraud’, say her two sisters (Picture: AP/Getty)
Sacheen Littlefeather, the noted civil rights activist and actress who died earlier this month, has been accused of making up her Native American heritage by her two sisters.
Best known for her appearance at the 1973 Academy Awards, where she spoke on behalf of Marlon Brando to refuse his best actor Oscar for The Godfather in a protest over Native American mistreatment by the industry, Littlefeather died aged 75 on October 2.
Just over two weeks prior to her death, Littlefeather had attended a special evening in her own honour, held by The Academy, who apologised for her treatment at their event, where she was heckled, almost 50 years after the fact.
Littlefeather said that her protest in 1973, and the almost instant backlash to it, saw her blacklisted in the industry.
She also claimed that Western star John Wayne’s reaction to her protest was ‘the most violent moment ever’ at the Academy Awards, with the actor reportedly restrained by six security people to stop him from assaulting her.
Now, the activist’s biological sisters, Rosalind Cruz and Trudy Orlandi, have said that Littlefeather’s claim of White Mountain Apache heritage is a lie and that there is no known Native American ancestry in their family.
The actress and activist holding a letter written by Marlon Brando at the 1973 Academy Awards, in which he refused his Oscar (Picture: Michael Ochs Archvies/Getty Images)
Littlefeather received backlash to her protest on behalf of Brando (Picture: Bettmann Archive)
The sisters, who identify as ‘Spanish’ on their father’s side, claim that she was instead, like them, half-Mexican.
Littlefeather had always maintained her father was of Apache and Yaqui ancestry, while her mother was white European-American.
Cruz and Orlandi are now refuting that fact in a bid to clear their father and family’s name, after Littlefeather – who they knew by the nickname ‘Deb’ growing up – claimed he was an abusive alcoholic and that she grew up in poverty in a ‘shack’.
‘It is a fraud,’ Cruz told The San Francisco Chronicle.
The activist’s sisters say they are speaking now to clear their father’s name (Picture: Beck Starr/FilmMagic)
‘It’s disgusting to the heritage of the tribal people. And it’s just … insulting to my parents.’
Cruz added to the paper: ‘[Our father] was born into poverty. His father, George Cruz, was an alcoholic who was violent and used to beat him. And he was passed to foster homes and family. But my sister Sacheen took what happened to him.’
Littlefeather was known to have born Maria Louise Cruz, and an investigation by the publication’s reporter, Native American Jacqueline Keeler, claimed to have found no evidence of Native American ethnicity or White Mountain Apache tribe enrolment in her family’s records, dating back to 1850.
Both Cruz and Orlandi said it was troubling to see their sister ‘venerated as a saint’ after her death but had kept quiet over the years as they assumed Littlefeather’s fame would eventually dissipate.
Just a fortnight before her death, the Acadmey held an evening in Littlefeather’s honour in September, as part of its formal apology to her for her treatment (Picture: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images)
During the An Evening with Sacheen Littlefeather event at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles on September 17, Littlefeather said: ‘I am here accepting this apology. Not only for me alone, but as acknowledgement, knowing that it was not only for me but for all our nations that also need to hear and deserve this apology tonight.’
She continued: ‘Now, I would like all the Indian people in this audience to stand. Look at our people, look at each other and be proud that we stand as survivors, all of us.
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‘Please, when I’m gone, always be reminded that wherever you stand for your truth, you will be keeping my voice and the voices of our nations and our people alive.
‘I remain Sacheen Littlefeather. Thank you.’
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