#ENOUGH
PLAYS TO END GUN VIOLENCE
#ENOUGH: Plays to End Gun Violence is a new campaign of theatre activism on a mission to provide middle and high school students with the platform to spark critical conversations about gun violence across the country. The project enables teens to express themselves through storytelling, foster open dialogue in their communities, take on leadership roles, and inspire creative action. Launched in 2019 by director Michael Cotey, #ENOUGH puts America’s young people at the center of the conversation on gun violence through the transformative power of storytelling. Beginning in January 2020 as a call for submissions from middle and high school students to write short 10-minute plays on the topic of gun violence, #ENOUGH culminates in an evening of simultaneous staged readings across the country of the most impactful plays student-written plays on December 14, 2020 – the 8th anniversary of Sandy Hook.
Call for Submissions January 1 – June 20, 2020
Middle and high school students write and submit short 10-minute plays on gun violence. The finalists will be chosen by a committee of award-winning playwrights including Lauren Gunderson, David Henry Hwang, Tarell Alvin McCraney, Robert Schenkkan and Karen Zacarías.
Nationwide Reading
December 14, 2020
Schools, theatres and other organizations across the country host simultaneous staged readings of the finalist #ENOUGH plays and local submissions on the 8th anniversary of Sandy Hook. #ENOUGH is for all our students. There is more to the problem of gun violence in our country than the threat of school shootings and mass shootings. On average, 21 young people are shot per day.*American children and teenagers are 4 times more likely to die by gunfire than their counterparts in Canada, 7 times more likely than young people in Israel, and 65 times more likely to be killed with a gun than children and teenagers in the United Kingdom.**Students need agency in this moment. Every student can achieve advocacy on behalf of their school, their communities and themselves. We just need to give them the room to do it. #ENOUGH will enable our young future leaders to turn theatre spaces into civic spaces, uniting communities despite their distances and differences with one voice saying it’s time to put an end to gun violence. It’s time we say ENOUGH .
Sign-up to receive updates & commit to hosting a reading. www.enoughplays.com
Questions? Please email Michael Cotey (Producer) at enoughplays@gmail.com .
*Children ages 1-17: https://www.bradyunited.org/key-statistics .
**Children’s Defense Fund, “Protect Children Not Guns 2013” (2013), p. 33, available at http://www.childrensdefense.org/child-research-data-publications/
data/protect-children-not-guns-2013.pdf.