The Heart Stays tells the story of two Native American sisters from Osage Nation who leave the traditions and safety of their Native Nation to follow their own long-held dreams-the older one to attend a distinguished college and the younger one to become a rock star. Soon after leaving their beloved land and community their life journeys collide with racism, drugs and violence forcing the older sister to choose between her own life’s work and saving her sister’s life.
Diane Fraher writes and directs narrative feature films about contemporary Native Americans. In her words, her films “explore the struggle of Native Americans to identify with traditional values within the context of modern society.” An enrolled Member of Osage Nation with documented Cherokee heritage as well, she is one of the artists who formed the New York Movement in Contemporary Native Arts, the only such Native American arts movement in the United States, outside of Santa Fe, NM. Her first feature-length narrative film, The Reawakening, was the first feature film written and directed by a Native woman and wholly produced by Native people. Ms. Fraher’s new feature film, The Heart Stays, is the first narrative film written, directed and produced by a Native American woman to receive distribution .
In 1987 Ms. Fraher founded American Indian Artists Inc., (AMERINDA) New York, NY, a Native community-based multi-arts organization. Amerinda is the only multidisciplinary arts organization of its kind in the United States providing programs and services to emerging and established Native American artists.
Diane Fraher has received numerous fellowships, individual artist grant awards and for her filmmaking including: a 2013 Fellow in Screenwriting from the New York Foundation for the Arts and a 2019 Made in NY Womens Film Fund Fellowship for The Heart Stays.
