Gun treatise “Thoughts and Prayers” to play at Manhattan theater
by Garth Meyer
Veteran South Bay actor, director and play producer Jack Messenger will present, direct and act in a staged reading of his play, “Thoughts and Prayers” at the Manhattan Beach Community Church Theater over Labor Day weekend, in three free performances.
Donations at the door go to three gun safety charities.
Messenger, the producer/director of New Stuff Productions, based in Manhattan Beach, conferred on the play with Fred Guttenberg, a friend of a friend whose daughter was killed at Parkland, Fla. in 2018.
“I have immersed my life in this since Parkland,” Messenger said. “I have constantly been aggravated by the amount of violence in this country. The bane, the scourge of our American society is maximized by guns.”
“I tried to get this into six playhouses up and down the coast,” Messenger said. “They said ‘Our subscription base is not going to like this, it’s too controversial, too political and too violent.’”
“This is a political play in a hot political moment, the number 1 political issue, gun violence. The Second Amendment vs. the Sixth Commandment; thou shalt not kill. The Second Amendment was written for everyone. But it appears that only responsible people in today’s society can manage it lawfully.”
This is the first play Messenger has written.
“What is protection for you isn’t necessarily protection for me, or the guy down the street,” he said.
“Automatics, semi-automatic weapons give a license to cowards to do what they otherwise wouldn’t do.”
So why Parkland, why not a major shooting before that?
“I think I wasn’t p—ed off enough,” Messenger said. “I thought, this is terrible, they’re going to get a handle on this. But they never did.”
The play’s main character, Senator Abraham Griffin, portrayed by Messenger, is modeled after Texas Republican Senator John Cornyn.
“He’s in the pockets of the NRA, but he’s not as brazen or extremist as Ted Cruz,” he said.
The story is set in Round Rock, Texas, a suburb of Austin.
Messenger put on a reading at the Westchester Playhouse in 2023.
The play has a cast of nine. Messenger’s wife, Lois Bourgon, is the project’s executive producer. All proceeds from the staged readings go to Sandy Hook Promise, Everytown for Gun Safety and the Giffords Project.
“I want this play to be about the movement, about gun violence,” Messenger said. “I want this play to be about the South Bay trying to make a difference.”
As an actor, Messenger first appeared at the Manhattan Beach Community Church Theater in 1992 in “The Foreigner.” He has since directed plays there, as well as at Second Story Theater in Hermosa Beach and Newport Beach Theater Arts Center.
New Stuff Productions has put on plays in the South Bay since 2016.
A staged reading means actors sit on chairs at microphones, facing the audience with script in hand.
“I’ve got a couple surprises that I don’t want to tell you about,” Messenger said. “I’ll leave you with one word: polemic, this is what I’ve done.”
“Thoughts and Prayers” runs at Manhattan Beach Community Theater Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m., Aug. 30-Sept. 1. ER