Kaniehtiio Horn facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Kaniehtiio Horn
Horn in April 2018
Born	Kaniehtiio Alexandra Jessie Horn Batt (1986-11-08) November 8, 1986 (age 38) Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Other names	Tiio Horn
Alma mater	Dawson College
Occupation	Actor, film director, screenwriter
Years active	2004–present
Children	2
Parent(s)	Kahn-Tineta Horn (mother)
Relatives	Waneek Horn-Miller (half-sister)

Kaniehtiio Alexandra Jessie Horn (born November 8, 1986), also known as Tiio Horn, is a talented Canadian First Nations actress and filmmaker. She is a member of the Kahnawake Mohawk community. Kaniehtiio is the daughter of Kahn-Tineta Horn, a well-known political activist. Her half-sister is the athlete Waneek Horn-Miller.

Kaniehtiio Horn is famous for her roles in many TV shows. She played Tanis on Letterkenny (2016–23), Monica Bellow on 18 to Life (2010–11), Destiny Rumancek on Hemlock Grove (2013–15), Gina on The Man in the High Castle (2016–18), and Deer Lady on Reservation Dogs (2021–23).

Horn has won two Canadian Screen Awards for her acting in Letterkenny. She also won a Directors Guild of Canada Award for her first movie as a director, the horror comedy Seeds, which came out in 2024.

Early Life and Background

Kaniehtiio Horn was born in Ottawa, Canada. She spent her childhood in Ottawa and on the Kahnawake Mohawk reserve, which is near Montreal. Her mother, Kahn-Tineta Horn, was a model and is a political activist for the Kahnawake First Nation. Her father is a lawyer with German and Scottish heritage.

When Kaniehtiio was four years old, she and her mother and older half-sister, Waneek, were involved in the Oka Crisis in 1990. This was a difficult time for the Mohawk people. A famous photograph from this event, showing Kaniehtiio and her sister, became a symbol of the standoff between the Mohawks and the Canadian government. Waneek later became a broadcaster and co-captain of the Canadian women's water polo team at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

Kaniehtiio decided she wanted to be an actress when she was young. However, as a teenager, she focused on swimming and water polo. She later studied theatre arts at Dawson College and graduated in 2005. After college, she started appearing in short films.

Acting and Directing Career

Kaniehtiio Horn's first acting role in a film was in 2006. It was for a CBC television mini-series called Indian Summer: The Oka Crisis. This was especially meaningful because she had been present at the real-life event years earlier.

In 2007, she got a role in the drama film The Colony. The next year, she was nominated for a Gemini Award for her part in the TV film Moccasin Flats: Redemption. She also appeared in Journey to the Center of the Earth with Brendan Fraser.

In 2009, Horn starred in The Trotsky, playing a high school student in Montreal. She also appeared in Web of Lies, The Wild Hunt, and Leslie, My Name Is Evil. These Canadian films were shown at the Festival du Nouveau Cinéma. The Trotsky and The Wild Hunt were even named among the Top 10 Canadian films at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival.

Kaniehtiio Horn became well-known for her role as Monica Bellow in the CBC television sitcom 18 to Life. The show was also shown in the US. She also voiced characters in By the Rapids, an APTN cartoon she helped create. In 2010, she worked again with director Jacob Tierney in the film Good Neighbours.

In 2011, Horn appeared in the horror film The Theatre Bizarre and played a priestess in Immortals. She also filmed Penthouse North with Michelle Monaghan and Michael Keaton. In 2012, she joined the cast of the Netflix drama Hemlock Grove as Destiny Rumancek, a Romani witch.

Horn also lent her voice to the video game Assassin's Creed III in 2012. She played Kaniehtí:io, the Mohawk mother of the main character. That same year, she wrote and directed her first film, The Smoke Shack. In 2013, she played Rynn in the Syfy TV series Defiance. She also appeared as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz in an episode of Supernatural. She was also in Embrace of the Vampire and the Amazon series The Man in the High Castle (TV Series).

Kaniehtiio Horn has a recurring role as Tanis in the CraveTV series Letterkenny. For this role, she won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series in 2022. She also works as a Consulting Producer on the Letterkenny spin-off show Shoresy. Her job there is to make sure the Indigenous characters are shown accurately.

In 2020, Horn was a panelist on Canada Reads, where she supported Eden Robinson's novel Son of a Trickster. From 2021 to 2023, she played the recurring role of Deer Lady in the FX/Hulu show Reservation Dogs. In 2022, she appeared as Feather Day in season 2 of the Peacock series Rutherford Falls.

Her first film as a director, Seeds, was shown at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival.

Personal Life

Kaniehtiio Horn became a mother to a son in November 2020.

Filmography

Film

Feature films

Short films

Television

Television series

Television films and miniseries

Video games

Awards and Nominations