The Black Response premieres its short film “Where Do Black Men Live?” – a fictionalized portrayal of the experiences of low-income and housing insecure Black men in Cambridge – Thursday at The Foundry, with a panel discussion afterward.
Directed by Corinne Spencer and co-directed by Gift Tapiwa Marovatsanga and Joy Wrolson, the film is based on 25 ethnographic interviews – a less intrusive and artificial approach to research – conducted between May 2021 and November 2022 by Stephanie Guirand. Its format is inspired by Lee Mun Wah’s “The Color of Fear,” a documentary in which 16 men of different racial and ethnic backgrounds engage in a dialogue about race in America.
Guirand, who immigrated to the United States from Haiti as a child and grew up in Cambridge public housing, co-founded The Black Response in June 2020 after the pandemic put her doctoral studies in sociology at Goldsmiths, University of London, on hold. The organization, grounded in abolitionist principles, works to replace policing and other carceral systems in Cambridge with community-grounded solutions.
Guirand redesigned her thesis research to focus on where and how Black men live in Cambridge, embedding herself in Community Service Care, a Jamaica Plain nonprofit and physical sponsor of The Black Response. As one of the organization’s community first responders, she started interviewing low-income and housing insecure Black men, joining them in their daily activities and taking narrative accounts as she did so.
“The ethnographic process made it feel really natural, and we all became friends over time,” Guirand said. “A lot of times we were walking to different places, or I would get in their cars and we would drive somewhere. We spent a lot of time collecting paperwork and waiting in line, and I would just jot down notes as we went.”
Creating the film
She spoke with 41 men, 25 of whom agreed to be included in her dissertation, which then led to the film.
“I got involved with a group of creatives really early on to talk about grouping the major themes and selecting some of the stories to highlight,” Guirand said.
The creative team, which includes Spencer, Marovatsanga and Wrolson, as well as project manager Virginia Cuello, first wrote a play that was performed on Zoom during the pandemic, then began adapting it into the scripted film that became “Where Do Black Men Live?” The film features narrative accounts by the men themselves – they either wrote the lines or approved Guirand’s notes on their spoken narratives – performed by actors in a style similar to verbatim theater.
“We wanted to put their accounts in conversation with one another, as though the men were sitting and talking to each other, because there were so many common themes and experiences,” Guirand said.
The film, which was funded by the Massachusetts Humanities Council, The Navigation Fund, Borealis Philanthropies, New England War Tax Resistance and Ben & Jerry’s Foundation, sheds light on what Guirand calls “harms that typically remain hidden from public view,” including incarceration, housing transience and systemic racism. It depicts these Cambridge residents’ experience with being unhoused and underhoused while navigating jobs and social lives.
“Black men live in a state of perpetual motion, bearing more than their share of the burdens that are externally and politically developed,” Guirand said. “The members of their networks, the larger community and even the government end up shouldering the burdens created by ineffective, classist and punitive social housing policies.”
A short scene from the film (without color correction) is here:
Screenings through May and June
Thanks to a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, in addition to Thursday’s screening, The Black Response hosts three screenings in May and June. Each will feature a themed panel discussion or, in one case, a keynote speaker, with participants curated by Guirand and her team.
“The hope is that these conversations will really add to what the audience is seeing in the film and the themes and messages we’re exploring,” Guirand said.
The premiere event’s panel will feature Emmanuel Okeke, one of the film’s actors, who will reflect on his role and his experience with housing insecurity; Chenjerai Kumanyika, assistant professor at New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and co-creator/creator of the podcasts “Uncivil” and “Empire City,” which helped shape The Black Response’s abolitionist lens, who will speak on race, policing and resistance; Sandra Susan Smith, director of the Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and faculty director of its program in criminal justice policy and management, who will share insights on structural neglect and divestment in Black communities; and Spencer Piston, associate professor of political science at Boston University and an examiner on Guirand’s dissertation, who will offer his perspective on its core arguments and goals.
A second screening is 6 p.m. May 29 at the Cambridge Main Library, with a panel discussion on housing justice facilitated by Banti Gheneti of the Cambridge Housing Justice Coalition. Speakers include Lee Farris and Khalida Griffin of the coalition’s Municipal Voucher Working Group, who will discuss the movement for city-funded housing vouchers; Margaret Brady and Rebecca Mailman of the Cambridge Community Land Trust, who will explain efforts to create permanently affordable housing; LeNay Harper, an experienced transitional services manager who will share insights on supportive housing and reentry systems; and Kaleb Abebe and Donnie Lee, two Black Cantabrigians who will speak to their experiences with housing insecurity.
The film screens at 11:15 a.m. June 19 at The Brattle Theatre with a keynote speech from Ukumbwa Sauti, a lecturer at Boston University’s School of Social Work whose work explores the cultural and social impact of media narratives. A Juneteenth celebration on Cambridge Common follows.
The final screening takes place on Zoom at 6 p.m. June 26, followed by a discussion with members of the creative team: Spencer, director and producer; Wrolson, co-director and dramaturg; Marovatsanga, co-director and scriptwriter; and Cuello, project manager.
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I went last night. Just GO to one of these screenings if you can!