Cinematic Arts and Technology Department Chair James Lujan (Taos Pueblo)

“Story is the most important thing,” says Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) Cinematic Arts and Technology Department Chair James Lujan (Taos Pueblo), MFA, leaning into the word that defines his vision. “It’s what separates us from other film programs in New Mexico.”

Lujan spoke to students and faculty on November 19 in the CLE Commons about three pivotal projects that formed the backbone of his 2024 Sabbatical.  

“We are not a trade school, we are an art school,” Lujan emphasized. “Story separates us from other schools. Lujan recounted how that hadn’t been the case when he first joined the school in 2012.  Now, he points out, IAIA is winning top awards at the New Mexico Film Foundation. “There is something to this story thing,” he says. 

Luhan detailed his own “stories” in progress and a finished play, “Kino and Teresa” which is a Romeo and Juliet adaptation set after the Pueblo Revolt. The play appeared in the Shakespeare anthology, “The Bard in the Borderlands,” and was produced in 2005 at the Autry in Los Angeles. Lujan also used some of his time on sabbatical to speak about the play at the Borderlands Shakespeare Conference in San Antonia at Texas A&M University in March. “I’ve been working on it for twenty years,” Lujan explains, going on to say he is currently planning a screenplay of the play the Los Angeles Times called “Beautifully done.”  

The rewriting of Lujan’s feature-length screenplay, “Fast Elk,” about a Native American superhero and the development and writing of the first three episodes of a one-hour TV drama series, The Tomahawk, rounded out the discussion.  

Lujan detailed the ways in which “Fast Elk” had possibly been fast-tracked to production at a new facility in Albuquerque; only derailed at the last minute by staff changes. “This is the business,” he says, resignedly but resolute.  

He went on to share pitch deck images from his potential new six-part TV series, The Tomahawk which takes a Native newspaper in peril and puts it in the center of a potentially supernatural series of events. “We are shopping it around to get it in front of big companies,” he explains, then going on to detail the disappointment when Netflix and Amazon “have their own similar series in development.”  

 “Hollywood is a copycat business,” Lujan says, saying that the recent groundswell of interest in Native concepted and produced pieces has a downside in a now more competitive pool from which to be chosen.