MOVIE PREMIERE: Sunday, July 14 at 8 p.m. ET/7C; encore at 10 p.m.
The movie is executive produced by Sergio Alfaro, Michaline Babich and Shad “Bow Wow” Moss(Growing Up Hip Hop). The production is inspired by real-life kidnapping of Jordan Boudreaux ( played by Chyna Lane), who is snatched off the street by her ex-boyfriend, Steve (played by Curtis Hamilton), in the middle of the day.
Chyna said that viewers should expect an intense and suspenseful drama.
“It’ll definitely have you on the edge of your seat. It is about Jordan Boudreaux, whom I play. She’s in a relationship with someone who she thinks is her dream man. Curtis Hamilton plays him. They have a 2-year-old son together. She’s a strong powerful mom who ends up in this abusive relationship, and when she tries to leave Steve, he abducts her in broad daylight. Then, her family tries to find her. The entire community tries to rally together; they try to look for her, and the cousin, Malik who is played by Shad Moss… They never give up, and she never stops fighting. We just find out what happens in the end.”
According to Curtis, it wasn’t shocking to learn that the story is factual. “These true-crime stories are very common and prevalent especially in that community; but, truly all over the world probably. We’ve heard and seen different movies, TV shows, and documentaries that are very much similar. At the end of the day, it’s sad, domestic violence is real. It unfortunately happens all the time to men, to women, any age. We’re just hoping that this movie actually touches someone” Curtis implies that the film would help someone else identify red flags in real-time. “That’s the most important thing. This film is a lesson.”
“Obviously, domestic violence is something that’s heavy in our community,” added Chyna. “It’s not something that’s talked about as much as it should be talked about, but I think that the thing that I was surprised about, particularly with this story was how Steve took that extra step, he took out his rage on Jordan. Without giving away the movie, I was incredibly surprised and even inspired with her family and the things they did to find her at the end. When you actually see Malik, Shad’s character at the end, I think that everyone’s going to be surprised. I don’t know if that’s something that people have seen before on television.”
The other fantastic bullet point that TV One highlighted in this movie is heroism within a black community. The entire assembly of black people banned together and searched for Jordan. Most people in today’s society, in black communities will flick on the news, see a kidnapping report, and switch the channel. People, in this day-and-age, will pull out a cell phone, and record an assault or kidnapping on FaceBook live faster than they would trying to prevent it. Unfortunately, this is an unsympathetic fact.
“I think,” shares Chyna, “heroism is uncommon in black communities because there is a bit of denial. We see a lot of that in the beginning of the movie where the denial takes place, but at that point, when they finally understand what’s happening, we see the power of community and we see the power of family, and [we see] that true saying, “It takes a village to raise and protect our own. So, to see the family, and for TV One to show, on the screen how black people really work together and how we really love our own-- There’s this unconditional love that we have for each other, [and] it’s incredibly inspirational to see.”
Curtis said that that they had great chemistry on-set. “Everybody was very chill, willing to work and very talented, just wanting to create a great film. With productions like this that is so quick, you need unity, and you need to be on one accord. Fortunately, we did get that. Everybody is excited. Everybody enjoyed it. Even after the film, we enjoyed each other off-screen.”
Curtis believes that Steve lacked self-love, and that’s what drove him to that level of insanity or irrationality to abduct Jordan.
“Self hate, not loving himself—I think he put himself in a position where it got too far. He battled mental illness and a lot of things internally that he didn’t express to anyone. It just got to a point where he put himself in that position where he couldn’t turn back. He continued to try to cover it up with more anger and domestic violence, and the one person who truly loved him started putting her foot down by saying, ‘I’m not going to put up with this.’ By her fighting back, it made him react worse, because in his mind, he had nothing but her and his child. It was unfortunate that he didn’t allow himself to be loved by anyone else or allow himself to love himself."
Wow, that’s deep coming from the perspective of a man.
In preparations for the film, Curtis and Chyna used their own methods to connect with their characters.
“Well, the thing about being a woman, and being a black woman, a black mother,” says Chyna, “is that we have to be strong. It’s so easy to look at Jordan, see the circumstances she’s in, and say, ‘Oh, she’s the damsel. She should stall in the spirit of easy as an aptitude to fall into despair.’ For me, when I looked at who she is, and I looked at her life, I said, ‘There’s so much light in her. There’s so much love in her. One thing about a fighter, because she’s a fighter, a fighter is constantly going to look towards the light. A fighter is constantly going to lead with love. Throughout that and especially being a mother, we’re always trying even when its rough. We’re always trying to make it safe, and make it as lighted hearted for our child as possible because we want to protect them from that feeling of being in danger. I constantly, even in the darkest scenes, there was a lot of prayer. I did [pray], and that this character Jordan, she prays, tying constantly to look for the inspiration and the hope. It’s what kept me pushing and not making her character a victim. In my opinion, she’s a fighter and she is a survivor.”
“With any character," says Curtis, who's extremely jovial and bubbly, the complete opposite of Steve. "I read the script and got the full totality of that. Once I did that, I started to read what Steve was saying. I was taking his words, because obviously this is based on true events so I’m creating this character. Then, I tried to learn who he was. I started to make up colors he liked, his favorite music, and what he likes as far as hobbies goes. Then, when I would get into Steve, [I wondered] ‘did he have brothers? Did he have sisters?’ He didn’t have any of this. He grew [up] by himself. He had a family, a domestic violence past with his mom. He grew up very much similar to the way he was acting, and I created the character in that light. I tried to understand why he isolated himself. When he isolated himself, he wasn’t loved by anyone. He just loved himself. Once I did that, it helped me kinda understand [where the dark hatred came from] but at the same time, he was wrong. Even on set, I would isolate myself a lot. I’d listen to a lot of music. One of my favorite songs that I prepped for this role was by an artist named Kirby, called, Loved By You. It’s such an emotional song and it relates to this couple—the words written about the song are so similar to what was happening to this relationship, which was crazy. It really helped me dive into those emotions and get to those scary parts that I am not happy about, but I know there are people out there that can look to his character. I hope that they have a stronger will than Steve did.”
MOVIE DESCRIPTION: IN BROAD DAYLIGHT, starring and executive produced by Shad "Bow Wow" Moss (Growing Up Hip Hop: Atlanta), Chyna Layne (She's Gotta Have It - Series) and Curtis Hamilton (Surviving Compton: Dre, Suge & Michel'le), tells the story of Jordan Boudreaux (Lane), who gets abducted by her obsessed and estranged boyfriend Steve (Hamilton). Jordan's family rallies the community while her closest cousin, Malik (Moss), makes it his personal mission to find and bring her home safely. The family, community and police band together to find Jordan before it's too late.