November 7 - December 7 | The Den Theatre

written by Stephanie Alison Walker

directed by Nathan Dale Short
assistant direction by Emma Leeper

You think you know your friends, your neighbors, your spouse, but what happens when you suddenly find out they have a garage full of guns? This new dark comedy explores the complicated issue of gun proliferation when two young liberal couples are forced to confront their assumptions about who should own a gun and why. The time of easy answers regarding this issue is long gone. In the wake of current events, we are all forced to reexamine our strongly held beliefs about gun ownership. Friends With Guns explores the question of what we can compartmentalize…and what we can’t. It examines what happens when guns enter the conversation. It pulls the curtain back on liberals with guns. It asks what happens when suddenly one person in a marriage does a 180 on the gun issue.

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author’s note

“No matter where you stand–for guns, against guns, somewhere in the middle–you can set down the outrage and listen to the other side.”

— Stephanie Alison Walker

Hi. You might/probably/most definitely will find yourself being “triggered” by this play. It’s that way by design. Whether you identify as anti-gun or pro-gun, you very well might/probably/most definitely will find yourself feeling uncomfortable or confronted at least once or twice during the play. I have an invitation for you: when that happens, when you find the play getting to you, I invite you to investigate what might be at the source of this reaction. Dig deep. See if there is something underneath it you’ve never before seen.
For me, writing this play took a tremendous amount of fear-facing, deep digging, and confronting my upset and rage. I found that at the heart of my activation was the utter lack of control I felt around the issue of guns. And not just around guns, but, like, everything in the world right now. At a primal level. If you’re anything like me, you want to at least feel in control of the world around you and you don’t. We can’t. It’s utterly impossible to feel anything resembling control or stability when every day 100 Americans are killed with guns. We so desperately want to feel in control, because the alternative is helplessness, and that feeling is just too difficult to live in. So instead we give ourselves over to rage. Outrage. Righteous indignation. Because at least it feels like we’re doing something. We’re engaged. We’re enraged. And I get it.
What I discovered through writing this play is that my own personal outrage was actually serving as a tonic to that feeling of helplessness. It was medicinal. But the side effects were taking a toll, and after a while, the tonic’s healing properties stopped working on me. So I did what I do when I’m facing something I don’t understand—either about myself or the world around me—I write a play. I wrote Friends With Guns because I grew tired of the outrage—my own and everyone else’s. I tired of the outrage. I tired of the yelling. I tired of nobody listening. I thought maybe it was time for me to listen. I set down my righteousness and I stepped into this play. Into the unknown. Into my fear. I stepped into it with a commitment to leave all of my strongly held beliefs at the door. And believe me, it was terrifying. But I did it. And you can too. No matter where you stand—for guns, against guns, somewhere in the middle—you can set down the outrage and listen to the other side. Even just for the duration of this play. That’s my invitation. As Leah suggests to Shannon, “Set the fear down. You can pick it up when we leave.”

DIRECTOR’S NOTE

“I didn’t ever think of it as a gun play. I thought of it as a mirror that reflects how complicated it’s become to hold empathy in a country built on both freedom and fear.”

— Nathan Dale Short

When I first read Friends With Guns, I laughed, then I winced, then I laughed again, and ended with so many questions. I didn’t ever think of it as a “gun play.” I thought of it as a mirror that reflects how complicated it’s become to hold empathy in a country built on both freedom and fear.
We are living in a time when it feels harder and harder to talk to each other. Every conversation risks becoming a declaration; every belief a boundary. The noise is constant, and the stakes always seem too high. And yet, look at the people around you now: gathered in a room, choosing to listen to a story about two couples trying (and failing, and trying again) to understand one another.
What I love about this play is that it doesn’t hand us answers. It doesn’t tell us who’s right. Instead, it offers an honest, often uncomfortable question: What does safety mean, and who gets to feel it?
Directing Friends With Guns has meant sitting in that discomfort; honoring both the fear and the tenderness that drive us to protect what we love. It's been a reminder that we can’t heal what we refuse to look at; that compassion without curiosity isn’t really compassion at all.
At Short Leap, our mission is to build community through brave conversation. I hope tonight’s performance reminds you that dialogue—real, messy, human dialogue—is still possible. That we can disagree and still reach for understanding. That we can feel afraid and still choose connection.
Thank you for coming, for leaning in when it might be easier to tune out. Theatre only works when we do it together, when we continue the conversation, when we celebrate your win, my win, our win.