The Pickens Brothers: Native American Trojans on their Journey from Oklahoma to SCA
by Ryan Dee Gilmour
Growing up poor in Oklahoma City, Blake and Brian Pickens felt millions of miles away from a career in film, television, and video games. But after working in entertainment for over a decade, Blake (Stark ‘14), the comedian and filmmaker, and Brian (IMGD ‘18), the game developer, count their time at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, and their Chickasaw upbringing, as key steps in their journey.
The Pickens brothers’ cultural inclination toward collaborating led to early success for both. Blake Pickens’ first-produced film, The Land, directed by Trojan Steven Capel Jr., was a Sundance hit. This past fall, Blake made his directorial debut with the Disney/AFI short film Ricky Killed a Guy.
Blake Pickens Timeline (Photographed on the left)
2014: Graduated from the Peter Stark Producing Program
2016: First Sundance Film Festival film with The Land
2021: Second Sundance Film Festival film with Wild Indian
2023: Disney Launchpad producing credit with The Roof
Brian Pickens Timeline (Photographed on the right)
2018: Graduated from Interactive Media & Games Division, MFA
2018 - 2019: Game Programmer - D3 Publisher of America, INC.
2019 - 2021: GamePlay Engineer - Kung Fu Factory (Worked with LEGO, Nickelodeon, Atari IPs)
2022: Technical Designer - Sirvo Studios
2023: Game Developer - Tender Claws (Stranger Things VR)
Brian Pickens took his training at USC and made a mark in the emerging world of VR design, including projects with LEGO and Stranger Things. He also kept his career in the family by working with the Trojan-founded Sirvo Studios. Brian’s VR work is being pioneered on the new Meta Quest headset.
“No one in our community had done anything in entertainment so it was a leap of faith to go to film school,” says Blake. “There weren’t really Native role models that we could follow, so USC was the only path we had even heard of. That’s why giving back is so important to me. I want people to know what’s possible. It didn't seem like a real thing. Working in Hollywood. When you're poor it doesn’t seem real.”
The Pickens Brothers credit their tight-knit Native American community and family, particularly their mother and father, for emphasizing that education was the way out of their circumstances.
Caption: The Pickens brothers captured in a Native American tipi during their upbringing.
“Our parents always said if you want to live a good life, you need education,” says Brian. “I didn't really know the path to game development, so I just tried a bunch of stuff out. That's how I ended up with undergraduate degrees in Psychology and Russian and then a graduate degree in Game Design—but work as an engineer. It seems random but when you’re poor you kind of chase opportunities as they come up.”
Enrolled Members of the Chickasaw Nation, the Pickenses say they are conditioned to think of their community every step of their career.
“For me, everything is community-driven,” says Blake. “When I'm doing something, I'm thinking not only about how this benefits me but how I can uplift others. That’s a very Chickasaw mindset that I go into every project with. ‘How do we do this as a community and how does this actually help people?’ That’s the way our tribe thinks and that’s the way Native American culture in general has taught us to approach life.”
Brian reiterates that their upbringing taught them to think of the community before the individual. “When you're making things—we were taught to consider how it fits in with everybody,” he says. “How people interact with something. Being Chickasaw gave me a unique perspective on game design because I’m always thinking about how the larger group interacts with a project. Which informs everything I do as a game designer. It’s natural.”
Caption: The Pickens brothers post on the red carpet at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.