Adam Beach might not have earned the Oscar nomination so many predicted but don't expect the amiable Ottawa-based actor to grumble.

"It's been a wonderful journey," he said.

Beach, 35, was speaking by cellphone, en route to Winnipeg after attending a Native spiritual retreat in the U.S.

"I wish a lot of people could see what I've seen," he said. "The best thing is I got great friends out of it -- people like (Oscar-nominated) Forest Whitaker and Rinko Kikuchi, people who act with their heart and soul. So it's cool."

A peek at Beach's private life in an instalment of MTV's Diary series, airing tonight at 7 p.m., reveals Hollywood recognition isn't the actor's top priority.

"My accomplishments are only successful if my very own people acknowledge and take to heart those accomplishments," he says in a voice-over.

The half-hour mini-documentary follows Beach through last August and September -- heady days leading up to the release of his Clint Eastwood film Flags of Our Fathers.

Cameras tail the easygoing Beach, of Saulteaux descent, as he headed back to the Winnipeg-area Dog Creek reserve he grew up on with his two brothers.

They were there the night he lost his campaign to become its chief -- he plans to run again in two years -- and when he visited the graves of his mother and father, who died in separate accidents when he was eight.

And they follow as he travelled with wife Tara Mason to appear as the guest of honour at White Mountain's Apache Reservation's year-end celebration, and on to Phoenix for a special screening of the film. There he met relatives of Ira Hayes, the Native soldier he portrayed in Flags and reflected on his success so far.

"I've accomplished what I wanted to accomplish, to be an actor," he says. "I've climbed the biggest mountain, the toughest mountain I could climb."

Beach said both Paramount and Warner Brothers lobbied hard on his behalf for an Academy Award nomination, giving him an insider's view of just what kind of big business is involved in "chasing that golden statue." He spent four months living in the Four Seasons, even earning the Palm Beach International Film Festival's Rising Star Award.

Beach, who has pledged to reflect his heritage accurately in all his roles, will have many opportunities in the near future. Last year he filmed, in the Calgary area, the HBO miniseries Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, portraying American Indian writer-activist Charles Eastman.

He will soon join the cast of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, portraying a Mohawk detective.

"For them to ask me on this show as a season regular for three years, I mean wow, that's a big compliment, and one of the first times for Indian people on the national level," he said. "This is going to catapult me to a different level, and it really sends a message to Native kids that one of us made it and they can make it too."