“Dear White People” actress Teyonah Parris plays a woman who returns to her hometown for the first time in a decade in writer-director Leila Djansi’s “Where Children Play.” Bell has spent the past ten years estranged from her family, but is finally brought back to Compton for a special event: her mother’s funeral. “I don’t think I can go back there,” Bell confides to her lover in the newly released trailer for the drama.
In Compton, Belle grudgingly agrees to nurse her ailing father — the man responsible for making her childhood hell. In her words, “He lost the right to be my father a long time ago.” Her father has been rendered weak by illness, but his legacy of abuse remains as strong as ever, as traumatized Bell struggles to cope with painful memories of the past.
It’s certainly nice to see Parris in a starring role after the frustration of watching her play such an underdeveloped character on “Mad Men.” We always wanted to see more of her as Dawn, Don Draper’s secretary.
“Where Children Play” opens this October in theaters. Macy Gray and Edwina Findley Dickerson (“Treme”) co-star.
