Hundreds of fans packed NeueHouse Hollywood on Monday night for an Emmys FYC panel with the team behind AMC’s noir thriller series Dark Winds, including stars Zahn McClarnon, Jenna Elfman, Jessica Matten, Kiowa Gordon, Jeremiah Bitsui, Deanna Allison and executive producer John Wirth.
The show, now in its third season, follows the lives of Navajo law enforcement officers in the 1970s as they solve mysteries in the present and face trauma from their past. Gordon, who stars as Officer Jim Chee — a character with both Native American and Irish roots — told the audience that his role helped him to reconcile with his multi-ethnic heritage.
“I have taken a big part of my life and kind of translated and molded it into what [Chee] has gone through as a Navajo man. He’s supposed to be part Irish; I come from a multi-ethnic background. With my mom, I’m Hualapai from Arizona, but also my dad is Scottish and all these other things from Europe,” Gordon said. “I do really sympathize with that aspect because my whole life growing up, I always felt like I was in an in-between world. I was within and without, and I didn’t belong to either side. And now it feels like I do with this family up here that I’ve grown to love and be the most vulnerable, raw and passionate version of myself that I can be.”
Series lead McLarnon shared how the tight-knit bond within the cast helped him through scenes where his character, Joe Leaphorn, relives the trauma he experienced as a Navajo boy forced to abandon his culture after being sent to a Christian boarding school.
“I’ve been through a lot of similar things — Joe’s Ketamine dream and his trauma that he experienced in that dream, and what he went through as a child. I went through a lot of the same things, so it was very easy for me to tap into that emotion,” he told the audience. “But yeah, you just bring your own life experiences to it and you surround yourself with people that care about you.”
Elfman joined the cast in season three, portraying FBI agent Sylvia Washington, who investigates a death that Joe may be involved in. She expressed her gratitude to AMC for allowing her to break out of the comedy roles she has played since the 1990s.
“I was so grateful to AMC for giving me the opportunity to come show other colors, which we don’t always get those opportunities as artists — especially if you have shown an ability in another genre, they like to stick you right in there and don’t let you leave,” she explained. “And AMC, from Fear the Walking Dead to this, has really been so generous in accepting and giving me the opportunity to show other sides of my artistry.”
Allison’s character, Emma Leaphorn, faced a particularly challenging season when her marriage to Joe came under strain after learning of his role in the death of a key character. She spoke about how her own childhood in a Native American community prepared her to play a character facing overwhelming personal hardships.
“My mom has always prepared me, since the time I was a little girl, that I would be facing adversity. And that’s one of the things that the coming-of-age ceremony will teach you, how to live through adversity when it comes to you,” Allison noted. “That honor that it has when you have that sacred moment where you go through the ceremony, that teaches you the preparation of what you’re going to do — four nights, no sleep, running east. You do things around the house for your community, and then you learn something as well about the people who come through. So that’s also part of what I brought to the stamina of Emma, just to be able to go into those dark places.”
Season three of Dark Winds wrapped up in April, and season four is expected to premiere in 2026.
