Indigenous 'Killers of the Flower Moon' Costume Designer Sues Apple for Racial Discrimination

An assistant costume designer on Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon is suing Apple Studios for racial discrimination and claims her work as a Native American was suppressed during awards season.

In a lawsuit, costume designer Kristi Marie Hoffman, a Native American, claims that her work on researching and designing costumes for the period epic was purposefully ignored and that she was systematically excluded from credit at the Academy Awards and the Costume Designers Guild Awards, according to The Wrap.

In her filing, Hoffman claims she was initially listed as the first assistant costume designer on the nominee list for the Costume Designers Guild Awards, but her name was erased at the behest of lead designer Jacqueline West — who decided that the credit should be applied equally and as a group to all the assistant designers, no matter what their role was on the film.

After filing a complaint, the Costume Designers Guild agreed with Hoffman that her credit removal from the Scorsese film was “improper.”

The designer further alleges that the removal of her credit was retaliation after she filed an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint over racial discrimination she claimed to have faced on the set of the film. The case was settled in 2022.

Hoffman also accused clothing consultant Julie O’Keefe of neglecting to credit her in interviews after West was nominated for an Academy Award. Her lawsuit claims breach of contract, retaliation, and infliction of emotional distress.

Her lawsuit states that she “poured her heart into” into the depiction of the Native Osage costumes for the film and “endured discriminatory conduct on the set.”

The filing adds that “she was subsequently discredited for her work during the film’s promotion and release and targeted with ads celebrating West and O’Keefe for the results of her hard work.”

Killers of the Flower Moon was nominated for Best Costume Design and Best Production Design along with eight other awards at this year’s Oscars. The film, though, was shut out and did not win any awards.

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