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Inside powerful stage play 'The Chronicles' focusing on gun violence awareness
Teens and young adults in Philadelphia are putting on a play to show the impact and trauma of gun violence and inspire others to choose the right path. FOX 29’s Shawnette Wilson has the story.
PHILADELPHIA - "Why the hell would you let him leave with this gun?" said a male cast member during an intense scene involving a single mom and her son’s father discussing a gun she found in their son’s room.
"I need you to talk to him before he destroys his life or someone else's," said the woman cast member. There is also a scene show a son’s strained relationship with his dad.
"I know you left my mom, and she had to raise me by herself," said the woman. The next scene involves a young boy showing off to a friend a loaded gun he found.
"Like this. Yo, where did you get that from? Yo, you would not even believe it," said the youth actor.
23-year-old Steven Wallace plays the older brother who walks in and tries to talk to the boys.
"The more knowledge that you have to the topic of gun violence if I'm being quite honest you can grow from it," said Wallace. He feels the play is relatable.
"To see the truth in some of these stories. To see that these are some people's lives on a consistent basis," he said.
The play is called The Chronicles: a powerful stage play showing the destruction of one gun moving through the hands of our youth.
"I feel like we always go through losing somebody. So, I feel like it was really good for us," said 13-year-old Azeriah Slater who is also a part of the production.
"It's gonna give parents the inside look at what kids our age actually go through," she said.
Muhammad Islam is the writer and director.
"We're going to go into that next scene," he said to the cast. It is his third year bringing the play to a theater in the city.
"Our teenagers are losing their lives at a number that I've never seen," said Islam. The response he says was too great to retire it.
"We got a lot of good feedback from people that were entertained and felt emotional about it," he said.
Kaliek Hayes says some of the youth are in his theater program. The play is on October 18th and 19th.
"It's just about really getting young people in a space where they can see what happens before it happens to them in order to make better decisions and better choices. We see what is happening with the gun violence in and around our city. The numbers are coming down, but it is still probably one of the biggest problems in the city," said Hayes who is the co-founder of Childhoodslost Foundation.