Tracey Deer

Mohawk filmmaker Tracey Deer’s debut feature Beans, a coming-of-age story about a young Mohawk girl’s experiences during the Oka Crisis, received its World Premiere at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to critical acclaim. Tracey was also honored with the prestigious TIFF Emerging Talent Award, presented to her by Ava DuVernay, and chosen as one of Variety’s 10 Screenwriters to Watch. The searing performances and poignant storytelling in Beans earned it 2nd Runner Up for the TIFF People’s Choice Award. Beans went on to win Best Motion Picture and Best First Feature Film at the 2021 Canadian Screen Awards, and Best Canadian Film and Most Popular Canadian Narrative (Audience Choice) at the Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF). Upon its first screening at an international film festival, the 2021 Berlinale, Beans was awarded the Crystal Bear for Best Film in the Generation Kplus (under 18) competition. 

Beginning her career in documentary, Tracey teamed up with Rezolution on feature documentaries One More River: The Deal that Split the Cree, Mohawk Girls, and Club Native, as well as the documentary series Working it Out Together, seasons 1-2. This collaboration continued into fiction television with the critically acclaimed dramedy Mohawk Girls, which ran for five seasons and on which she shared showrunning duties with creative partner Cynthia Knight. 

Tracey’s work has been honored with two Gemini Awards and numerous awards from multiple film festivals, including Hot Docs. She has worked with the CBC, the National Film Board (NFB), and numerous independent production companies throughout Canada in both documentary and fiction. She was nominated four years in a row for a Canadian Screen Award for Best Direction in a Comedy Series for Mohawk Girls and honored at TIFF 2016 as a recipient of the Birks Diamond Tribute Award.  

Tracey began production on Beans right after returning from LA, where she was a writing co-EP on season 3 of the Netflix/CBC series Anne with an E, working alongside showrunner Moira Walley-Beckett (an Emmy winner for Breaking Bad). Tracey wrote one episode of Anne with an E and co-wrote a second. Her feature projects in development include Thorpe, a biopic about the legendary indigenous athlete James Thorpe, produced by Pictureworks Entertainment and a collective of indigenous tribes. 

Tracey’s recent television work includes directing on two seasons of Starz hit Outlander; Three Pines, produced by Left Bank Pictures (The Crown) and Amazon Studios based on the bestselling series by Louise Penny; Peacock’s Rutherford Falls. 

Tracey strongly believes in giving back to the community. In 2019, she was elected 1st Vice President of the Directors Guild of Canada. In 2017, she was appointed to the board of directors of the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television. She has mentored emerging talent as leader of the Director Training Program at the imagineNATIVE Film & Media Arts Festival. She has also been a guest mentor at the National Screen Institute (NSI) New Indigenous Voices Program and a directing mentor for NSI’s new IndigiDocs training course.