As a child, Lindsay Marie Anuhea Watson dreamed of living the life she lives now. “I knew my path was going to look different than most people,” said Watson, 29.
The Maui-born actress is best known for the popular Netflix film Finding ʻOhana (2021) and for the independent film The Wind & the Reckoning (2022), notably the first film out of Hawaiʻi to qualify for an Oscar nomination.
Earlier this year, Watson was named a Gold List 2024 winner (best breakout performance) by Goldhouse for her starring role in The Wind & The Reckoning. The Gold List for Film honors the year’s most outstanding Asian Pacific achievements in the film industry.
With these accomplishments, the 2013 Kamehameha Schools Maui graduate has joined the small, but growing, group of Native Hawaiian feature film actors that includes the likes of Jason Momoa, Keanu Reeves, Jason Scott Lee, Kelly Hu and Auliʻi Cravalho.
The youngest of three children, Watson was raised in Kula. As a student at Kamehameha, Watson explored her creativity – initially in photography class. She became interested in acting while she was in middle school and in high school she joined the drama club. As a freshman, she landed her first role in the school’s production of Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory.
And with that, she was hooked.
In her junior year, as her teachers and classmates focused on preparing for college admission, Watson was ambivalent about enrolling at a university after high school. Her heart was set on pursuing a career in acting.
So instead of going on a “college tour” like some of her classmates, during her senior year Watson and her mom traveled to Los Angeles, where she attended acting workshops and met with agents and managers.
And right after graduating, Watson moved to Los Angeles and signed with her manager.
“At the time, there were no acting opportunities in film and television in Hawaiʻi,” she said. “It would have been awesome to have the opportunity to just stay home and pursue my career.”
Family friends offered to temporarily house her in Simi Valley, Calif., just north of Los Angeles. Watson spent six months with them before moving to North Hollywood. She shared a room with another aspiring actor, training and auditioning every day. To earn money, Watson also balanced shifts as a front desk worker at LA Fitness and as a nanny.
“Right off the bat, I was living in a new place, chasing this new career that I had little knowledge about,” Watson said. “A little island girl moving to LA by herself – that was crazy.”
The city’s fast pace and diversity was exciting, but also a culture shock.
“There was a part of me that had to harden up,” Watson recalled. “Imagine going out for five auditions a week, and not getting any of them. It was a lot of mental and physical strain.”
At first, she found it difficult to hold on to the values she was raised with in such a competitive, grueling industry; it was a challenge to retain her “aloha spirit” in that environment.
Back then, she couldn’t afford frequent trips home to Maui. So, to manage her loneliness, Watson spent time near the ocean which reminded her of time spent with her ʻohana back home. And she leaned on her sister, Kylie, who had also moved to the continent.
After a few years in Los Angeles, Watson befriended other Hawaiʻi expats. From hanging out, talking story and sharing meals together, they created a makeshift piece of Hawaiʻi in California.
Eventually, all her work and countless auditions paid off. Watson began modeling and scoring acting gigs in commercials.
And then she landed her big break: a lead role in Finding ʻOhana along with established Native Hawaiian actors Kelly Hu and Branscombe Richmond.
Soon after Finding ʻOhana wrapped, Watson secured the starring role of Piʻilani in The Wind & the Reckoning – the true story of Koʻolau, a paniolo from Kauaʻi who was stricken with leprosy around the time of the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom. For three years, Koʻolau, his wife, Piʻilani, and their son, Kaleimanu, evaded “provisional government” authorities bent on sending Koʻolau to the leper colony at Kalaupapa by hiding in Kauaʻi’s remote Kalalau Valley.
Watson was cast opposite actor Jason Scott Lee.
Taking on the role of Piʻilani was a huge kuleana. The complex emotions required to inhabit the character of Piʻilani, who eventually lost both her husband and her son to the disease, would be a daunting task for any actor.
Then two weeks before filming, the script changed from English to ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi.
“So many layers of responsibility weighed on me immediately,” Watson said. Although Watson took Hawaiian language classes at Kamehameha, she is not fluent.
Feeling that burden of responsibility and desiring to do right by the language and her culture, she briefly considered pulling out of the movie – but the team encouraged her to push forward.
“Our cultural advisors told us, ‘It’s in your blood. These are your ancestors,’” Watson said.
The only actor fluent in ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi in the cast was Kahiau Perreira, who played their son, Kaleimanu. With the help of the film’s cultural advisors, Watson and the rest of the adult cast spent weeks studying and practicing their lines in ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi to ensure that their cadence, inflection and pronunciation sounded authentic and fluent.
“It paid off,” said Watson. In September 2022, The Wind & The Reckoning premiered at the Boston Film Festival where it garnered nine awards including Best Film. At subsequent film festivals and later at theatres in Hawaiʻi and across the continent – the film continued to receive positive reviews.
“Our movie is a first of its kind, taking on the language, taking on our historical stories,” Watson said. “It’s been refreshing to hear from our kūpuna…that they are giving us the thumbs up.”
The Wind & The Reckoning can be streamed on multiple platforms including Amazon Prime and Apple TV.
While Watson will continue acting, she’s also developed an interest in writing and directing and wants to use her career to help preserve and share Hawaiʻi’s moʻolelo and contribute to the cultural renaissance.
“My biggest passion is acting and the arts and then, at the same time, I’m a proud Hawaiian,” Watson said. “That’s going to be my place in our history…using the medium of acting and film to preserve and push forward our culture.”
In April, Watson taught an ICAN (International Cultural Arts Network) class on Oʻahu, and this past June, she taught another ICAN class on Maui with Māori actor Alex Tarrant (NCIS: Hawaiʻi) and his wife, actress Luci Hare. ICAN is geared towards supporting Hawaiians and Hawaiʻi locals in the entertainment industry in Hawaiʻi.
Ultimately, Watson wants to be able to do what she loves back home. Until then, she is proudly representing Hawaiʻi on the continent.
“Culture, respect for the ʻāina, respect for our kūpuna, our ʻohana: that’s instilled in us since we were young,” Watson reflected. “You can’t just shake that off when you move somewhere else. It comes with you.”
