Christmas Play Tells Youths’ Own Stories

Rather than reindeer, angels or even a Grinch, “A Real Christmas Story,” is populated with drug users, gangbangers, foster children and misogynistic social workers.

“The reality is that Santa Claus is not coming down the chimney,” said Rosie Castro, 19, of Pacoima, an actress in the play.

Produced by New Directions for Youth, a Van Nuys agency that works with at-risk youth, the play will be performed at Sepulveda United Methodist Church tonight, the second of two performances.

Eight teenagers in the group drew upon their life experiences--abandonment, violence, parole officers and foster homes--to write the play.

And out of all of it, they found some hope.

“It’s about looking for the good in life,” said Carl Laddel, 13, of Mission Hills, who plays an 11-year-old abandoned by his mother, a crack addict.

Laddel’s character, along with a gang member and an addict, winds up in a foster home.

The foster children must deal with the consequences when the foster mother is accidentally wounded in a gang shooting.

“She has so much more love than the rest of us,” Castro said. “It helps us to focus on what is love.”

The eight actors and writers are members of Funds for Our Future, a theater group created at New Directions for Youth a year and a half ago. The money raised will fund a scholarship fund for youth.

“I realized that if you’re trying to find an alternative to the gang lifestyle, you have to find something with a lot of intensity,” said Paul Blanco, an outreach counselor who oversees the theater group.

Through acting, he says, the young people have found that intensity.

A former client of New Directions for Youth painted backdrop scenery with street scenes including an apartment building with the address 187--the police code for murder.

The hourlong play will begin at 7 p.m. at the church at 15435 Rayen St. Admission is $10 for a family of up to four members.

For more information call Blanco at (818) 375-1000.