(Image Credit: YouTube / Muriel Sasakamoose: Kind Heart and Secwepemc Matriarch - Alpha-Omega Productions)

By Ashley Legassic / Dylana Milobar

ALPHA-OMEGA PRODUCTIONS

Kamloops-based production company utilizing $50,000 Telus Storyhive grant

Aug 25, 2019 | 3:53 AM

KAMLOOPS — A Kamloops-based film production company has received a $50,000 grant for its next project.

Alpha-Omega Productions was chosen through Telus Storyhive and will now be able to use the money for their latest endeavor – Muriel Sasakamoose: Kind Heart and Secwepemc Matriarch.

Project Lead Nolan McAllister says they chose to tell Muriel’s story because of the impact she had on the community.

“She was the first Indigenous woman to be a board member for the Royal Inland Hospital Foundation. She was also one of the first Indigenous people to attend public school in Kamloops,” He explains, “Which I think was huge at the time given the residential school system being in place- so being able to go to public school was a huge, huge thing.”

Other accomplishments that will be shown through the film include Sasakamoose becoming the first Indigenous woman to run a provincial and federal election, and her being the last living, founding member of the BC Native Women’s Association.

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With the kind of impact Sasakamoose had on the community around her, McAllister says he hopes the film will be a source of inspiration to other Indigenous people throughout Canada.

“Being connected to her, and hearing her story, and hearing her accomplishments, and how she is paying it forward to the next generation, and her grandkids is really inspirational,” McAllister says, “I feel like in helping reconciliation in Canada, we need to be sharing positive stories.”

One top of the money from Telus Storyhive, Alpha-Omega Productions also received $5,000 from Creative BC. McAllister says they’re expecting the film to be released in the summer of 2020.

“We’re hoping that when it’s completed, we’ll be able to have a screening party in Kamloops for the community to come out and enjoy.”

(To view the Storyhive entry, click here)