Page 73 - Flaunt 171 - Summer of Our Discontent - Lili

closer to the truth. The beautiful cinematic, vintage tones captured by the lens of director Timothy Van Patten does not draw a veil over the raw complexities of race, gender, and police brutality. It confronts them head-on.
“Everyone signed on to tell the absolute truth,” says Chalk. “The unfortunate thing is that law enforcement has only gotten worse [since then].” Maybe 1930s America has not progressed as far as we might think, as we watch another power-hungry cor- rupt police department provoke instead of protect. Each shutter click from Mason’s analogue camera—which he brings every- where to capture the evidence others miss—seems to shock its viewers with glimpses of a reality that mirrors current day. “I think the show is successful by just telling the truth and adding
a little story to it.” Says Chalk. “I hope it shifts perspective and continues the conversation that the world is having right now.”
Quarantined with his wife in his Los Angeles home, Chalk consumes what is left of summer by taking this time to reflect, create, and find new ways to be useful to society. He remains resilient and hopeful for the future and urges young people of color to ask themselves where the source of all their negativity, doubt, and insecurities truly originate. “Once I realized that my belief system was given to me by people who hate me, I was able to stop believing in it,” Chalk admits. “If the world has a bunch of information that is trying to tell me who I am, in a sense creating a delusion for me, then I am going to create my own delusion.”
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PHOTOGRAPHER: NOLWEN CIFUENTES. STYLIST: JENNY RICKER AT A-FRAME AGENCY.