El Paso Matters – Stage production gives El Pasoans a voice after 2019 Walmart mass shooting

Playwright Gregory Ramos remembers the sorrow he felt after he learned about the mass shooting in El Paso on Aug. 3, 2019. He responded the way many artists do in those situations: He used art to heal.

Although he was living in Vermont at the time, Ramos, who has family roots in the borderland, decided to interview El Pasoans about their experiences tied to the racially motivated shooting at the Cielo Vista Walmart where 23 people died and 22 others were injured.

He returned to the Sun City in February and March 2020 and spoke to about 100 residents, quickly sensing that he could create something that could ease people’s pain.

The result is “Acts of Kindness: The El Paso Play,” which will be performed in El Paso this week as the community commemorates the fifth anniversary of the shooting.

Ramos, who spoke to El Paso Matters by phone from his home near Palm Springs, said that the play deals with the mass shooting and related thought-provoking topics such as gun control, immigration and political divisiveness. He admitted that the content could be disturbing.

“That’s what theatre is at its best,” said Ramos, now a professor and chair of the Department of Theatre Arts at the University of Redlands in California. “Sometimes it’s not comfortable.”

‘I still cry’

One of the El Pasoans who Ramos spoke with in 2020 was Adriana Dominguez, now an assistant professor of theatre at the University of Texas at El Paso. She was a student of Ramos when he served as an assistant professor of theater there from 1999-2004.

Dominguez will co-direct the performances with Samantha Michelle Nava, a UTEP assistant professor of practice and director of audience development in the Department of Theatre and Dance.

Six actors – three men and three women with ties to UTEP – will perform multiple roles that project the community’s anger, sadness and resilience. Each actor is responsible for three to eight characters who represent real people or composites. There are 23 roles in all.

Carolina Flores plays the role of Tina Chavez, an anthropology professor who shared her thoughts and reactions on the Walmart shooting, during a rehearsal for the play “Acts of Kindness,” July 28, 2024. (Corrie Boudreaux/El Paso Matters)

Dominguez said that she has wanted to produce this show in El Paso since she read the first script in 2021. She said she has followed the project’s progress and believes the latest version is the most refined – and emotional – adaptation.

“I’ve read the script about 60 times, and I still cry,” Dominguez said.

Nava and Dominguez cast the show at the end of May, and directed the actors to learn their lines before rehearsals started this summer. Once the cast regrouped, they began to develop each of their characters through voice, tone and body language as well as minimal props and costumes.

The crew will show the name of whichever character is talking on an LED screen during the show. The screen also will display photographs from the Aug. 3, 2019, shooting as well as political rallies that preceded the shooting and vigils that followed it.

During a recent rehearsal at the UTEP Basement Theatre in the Fox Fine Arts Center, the actors were seated in six off-centered chairs across the front of the stage. Among them was Aleyana Flores, a junior musical theatre major at UTEP. She was part of the student-faculty committee that suggested the university perform “Acts of Kindness.” She will portray three characters in the production to include U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso. She said her participation is part of her healing process.

Flores said that she thought it would become easier to relive the moments, but it got tougher. Despite the script’s heaviness, the Horizon City resident does not regret her involvement. 

“(The play) has a positive message, and we get peace for ourselves,” she said.

Ariyana Anaya, in the role of elementary school librarian Linda Garcia, recalls answering children’s questions about the Walmart shooting during a rehearsal for “Acts of Kindness,” a play based on El Paso’s response to the tragedy, July 28, 2024. (Corrie Boudreaux/El Paso Matters)

Flores recalled where she was when she learned about the shooting. She was clarinet section leader of the Horizon High School marching band. It was about 91 degrees with 28% humidity, according to the National Weather Service. The band had finished its morning practice and the students were at their lockers preparing to go home when the news broke a little after 10:30 a.m.

Patrick Crusius, then 21, drove 10 hours to El Paso from his home in Allen, Texas, to “kill Mexicans” with his AK-47 assault rifle. He turned 26 Saturday in state custody, where he faces state charges of capital murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Crusius pleaded guilty last year to federal hate crimes and weapons charges and sentenced to 90 consecutive life prison terms. 

Flores recalled how the band members were worried about family and started to check on the whereabouts of loved ones.

“It reminded me of how close-knit our community is,” Flores said.

Because of the seriousness of the topic, each rehearsal ends with light verbal, physical and mental exercises to separate the cast and crew from the production’s subject matter.

Xavier Felix performs as Steve Martinez, a police sergeant with the City of El Paso’s SWAT Team who responded to the Walmart shooting, in a rehearsal for the play “Acts of Kindness,” July 28, 2024. (Corrie Boudreaux/El Paso Matters)

Along those lines, the cast and crew has engaged in a “23 Acts of Kindness” effort to honor the 23 people killed in the shooting. They committed to do kind acts to brighten someone’s day for 23 days. For her part, Flores has written supportive messages to family members, baked treats for co-workers at a retail outlet, and paid for someone else’s gas.

“We wanted to push forward the positivity of the community,” she said.

Nava and Dominguez encouraged as many people as possible to attend the three performances to remember those who died, were injured or affected in some way.

‘We don’t want to forget’

Because of the seriousness of the material, a licensed mental health therapist will be at each performance to support audience members as necessary. Despite the dark subject matter, the production reflects positively on the community, the directors said.

“We don’t want to forget,” said Nava, who lived in Chicago when the shooting occurred. “We want to honor the families and celebrate the city’s resilience.”

Xavier Felix plays journalist Robert Holguin in “Acts of Kindness,” a play based on the Walmart shooting and its aftermath, July 28, 2024. (Corrie Boudreaux/El Paso Matters)

Dominguez lamented that part of the show’s importance is to remind people that acts of violence continue. The Gun Violence Archive defines a mass shooting as an incident where four or more people are shot or killed. According to the GVA, there were 272 mass shootings in 2014 in America and 656 in 2023. The number of mass shootings peaked at 689 in 2021.

“Mass shootings should not be normalized,” Dominguez said. “This show honors those who were impacted, and everyone was impacted somehow that day, and that’s what we’re watching on stage.”

A virtual presentation of “Acts of Kindness” was done by Repertorio Español in 2021 in New York, and a reading was done by Company of Angels theater group in 2023 in Los Angeles. Ramos’ play earned an honorable mention at the 2021 Latinx Voces National Playwriting Competition.

The El Paso production is funded through grants from UTEP’s College of Liberal Arts and Department of Theatre and Dance, as well as the Mexican American Cultural Center. The Museum of Art offered the use of its 220-seat venue. 

Disclosure: El Paso Matters founder and CEO Robert Moore was among the people playwright Gregory Ramos interviewed for his “Acts of Kindness” project and is one of the characters in the play.

The post Stage production gives El Pasoans a voice after 2019 Walmart mass shooting appeared first on El Paso Matters.

 Read: Read More