Producer Profile: Dustinn Craig and Sarah Colt

by Nancy Kelsey

Capturing the life of an elusive historical figure like Geronimo on film was no easy task. For co-directors/producers Dustinn Craig and Sarah Colt, telling Geronimo’s story as part of American Experience’s We Shall Remain: A Native History of America series was not a matter of re-capturing what was already noted in books and in Hollywood. It was an opportunity to tell stories from the perspective of Geronimo’s descendants who struggled in similar ways he did, forcing Craig and Colt to confront their perceptions of the legendary Apache leader.

“Growing up, I thought he was this Native superhero,” said Craig, a White Mountain Apache and Navajo from Arizona. “There’s this celebrity status that heroes of our past take on so that people no longer seem to know anything else about these characters.”

For Colt, who is non-Native and lives in Massachusetts, there is a valuable part of American history that is lost in the general public’s lack of knowledge about Geronimo and Chiricahua Apache.

“Growing up on the East Coast I knew we yelled his name when we jumped in the water,” she recalled. “Educating a non-Native audience is absolutely crucial.”

That’s why the project, which debuts on PBS May 4, became appealing to both Craig, an independent filmmaker, and Colt, a seasoned PBS producer, despite the dozens of films on Geronimo over the past few decades.

But getting Geronimo’s descendants, who now live mostly in New Mexico and Oklahoma, to talk about their tribe’s experiences was difficult to achieve.

“The reality of these stories is about the loss that Native peoples encountered–loss of language, loss of land and resistance just to keep your language and culture alive,” Craig said. “And all we have left in certain regards is our stories. We should be really protective of these stories.”

Early on Craig and Colt decided to be as respectful and inclusive as possible in this project. They also had to figure out how to tackle what Craig called a “general tribal cynicism” in some Natives communities. Some Apaches when they learned of PBS‘s interest in such a documentary responded with: “Let me guess, it’s about Geronimo, right?” or “Oh, Geronimo again. Don’t you get enough of Geronimo?”

To overcome this skepticism, the duo decided that their film would not tell the story of the Chiricahuas by exploring just one man. They wanted to include the perspectives of others attached to the story, whether that included good or bad reflections of Geronimo.

“I think we, right to the very end of the project, wanted to portray a real, living and breathing person. We struggled to understand him,” Colt said. “He was a very complicated person.”

Part of the film also discussed how Geronimo was viewed by his community. At times, Geronimo was not as popular among his people as he is portrayed in today’s history books. The film also tackles his band’s raid on villages while being hunted down by the U.S. Cavalry.

In retelling the story today, Craig and Colt tried to be mindful of the community’s perspectives. Craig even went before the Mescalero Apache’s tribal council in New Mexico to introduce the project. That nod of acknowledgment on behalf of PBS to a sovereign government didn’t warm all tribal members up to interviews, though. Craig said some declined to give on-camera interviews. For Craig, as a Native person, that was a bit of a conflict because he knew he had a job to do.

“Yes, I was a filmmaker and, yes, I was working on this project. Ultimately I didn’t promise them anything,” he said.

Since the final product was out of his control, he did not want to deceive those he interviewed in any way. “It was a gamble for them,” he said.

He hopes that they are satisfied with the end product.

“I just really believe that legacy belongs to the descendants,” Craig said.