Quinn, Simmons and Feore Featured in HBO's "Bury My Heart"

By Andrew Gans
May 9, 2007

Screen actor Aidan Quinn, who played Stanley Kowalski in the 1988 revival of A Streetcar Named Desire, stars in the new HBO Films production "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee."

Based on Dee Alexander Brown's book of the same name, the film will make its debut on the cable network May 27 at 9 PM ET. Joining Quinn in the cast are Broadway's J. K. Simmons (Laughter on the 23rd Floor, Guys and Dolls, Peter Pan) and Colm Feore (Julius Caesar) as well as Adam Beach, August Schellenberg, Eric Schweig, Wes Studi, Gordon Tootoosis, Fred Thompson and Anna Paquin.

Yves Simoneau directed the Wolf Films/Traveler's Rest Films production, which was produced by Clara George from a screenplay by Daniel Giat.

"Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee," according to press notes, begins "just after the bloody Sioux victory over General Custer at Little Big Horn [and] intertwines the unique perspectives of three characters: Charles Eastman (Beach), né Ohiyesa, a young, Dartmouth-educated, Sioux doctor held up as living proof of the alleged success of assimilation; Sitting Bull (Schellenberg), the proud Lakota chief who refuses to submit to U.S. government policies designed to strip his people of their identity, their dignity and their sacred land – the gold-laden Black Hills of the Dakotas; and Senator Henry Dawes (Quinn), who was one of the architects of the government policy on Indian affairs.

"While Eastman and patrician schoolteacher Elaine Goodale (Paquin) work to improve life for the Indians on the reservation, Senator Dawes lobbies President Grant (Thompson) for more humane treatment, opposing the bellicose stance of General William Tecumseh Sherman (Feore). Hope rises for the Indians in the form of the prophet Wovoka (Studi) and the Ghost Dance – a messianic movement that promises an end of their suffering under the white man. This hope is obliterated after the assassination of Sitting Bull and the massacre of hundreds of Indian men, women and children by the 7th Cavalry at Wounded Knee Creek on Dec. 29, 1890."

For a full schedule, interviews with the stars, a video preview, production stills and more information, visit HBO Films online at hbo.com/films/burymyheart.