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Killer Thriller: Your Daughter's New Boyfriend Could Be a Sex Trafficker · Legally Brunette

0:06
Speaker 1: Amy Robach and TJ Holmes present Killer Thriller with your host,
0:10
Speaker 1: Elisa Donovan.
0:14
Speaker 2: Hey everybody, Elisa Donovan here, and this is Killer Thriller.
0:19
Speaker 2: In Stolen from the Suburbs, a teenage girl, played by
0:22
Speaker 2: Sydney Sweeney, is drugged and abducted into a sex trafficking ring.
0:27
Speaker 2: When police fail to help, her mother turns to the
0:30
Speaker 2: one person who understands the world her daughter has disappeared into,
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Speaker 2: a trafficking survivor named Anna. Brooke Nevin plays Anna, and
0:39
Speaker 2: she has said the research she did for the role
0:41
Speaker 2: was harrowing, opening her eyes to the realities of modern-day
0:45
Speaker 2: sex trafficking in a way that stayed with her long
0:48
Speaker 2: after filming ended.
0:50
Speaker 1: Today, we are looking at.
0:51
Speaker 2: The terrifying reality behind the movie, how girls are targeted,
0:56
Speaker 2: how traffickers gain control, and what Brooke learned making the
0:59
Speaker 2: film that stayed with her long after the cameras stopped rolling.
1:03
Speaker 1: Hi, Brooke.
1:04
Speaker 2: Welcome to Killer Thriller. Thank you so much for talking
1:06
Speaker 2: with me today.
1:07
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me.
1:10
Speaker 2: I am so happy to see your face, I just
1:12
Speaker 2: want to say. So this movie is very intense and
1:18
Speaker 2: extraordinarily upsetting, but it talks about extraordinarily important things. So
1:26
Speaker 2: just quickly, 16-year-old Emma, who's played by Sidney Sweeney, goes
1:30
Speaker 2: from living a pretty ordinary suburban life to being drugged
1:34
Speaker 2: at a shopping mall and abducted into a sex trafficking operation.
1:38
Speaker 2: So when you first read that, did you think, could
1:42
Speaker 2: this really happen this way?
1:44
Speaker 1: This can't be real.
1:45
Speaker 3: I knew that my character was based on a real
1:51
Speaker 3: person and a real organization in Los Angeles. The circumstances
1:56
Speaker 3: surrounding the abduction of Emma somehow felt larger than life.
2:02
Speaker 3: But then talking to our director and the writer as well,
2:05
Speaker 3: Alex Wright, he explained to me that the inspiration for
2:09
Speaker 3: this project was indeed based on a real life story
2:13
Speaker 3: that hit close to home. And it blew my mind
2:15
Speaker 3: because he said that he got the idea for the
2:18
Speaker 3: movie because he had received an email from his teenage
2:23
Speaker 3: daughter's school saying that all the parents should come and
2:27
Speaker 3: pick up their children from school. Because that day, two
2:31
Speaker 3: teenage girls from one high school over had been abducted
2:36
Speaker 3: on Venice Boulevard.
2:37
Speaker 1: Oh, my God.
2:38
Speaker 3: So he, you know, obviously that was sitting with him
2:43
Speaker 3: and resonating deeply. And he picked up his daughter, held
2:48
Speaker 3: her close, and then kind of went down this dark
2:50
Speaker 3: rabbit hole of doing research about human trafficking in Los Angeles.
2:55
Speaker 3: And he used that information to do a pitch. Yeah.
2:59
Speaker 3: for this movie, presented it to producers. They read it
3:01
Speaker 3: and they're like, okay, but this doesn't really happen in
3:05
Speaker 3: Los Angeles. Right. They're like, this is a great story,
3:08
Speaker 3: but really? And then he, um, attached some more news
3:12
Speaker 3: articles and they realized that this was, you know, a
3:16
Speaker 3: movie that needed a story that needed to be told.
3:20
Speaker 2: So how, how far down the rabbit hole did you
3:23
Speaker 2: go preparing for this? Were you like, what were you reading, watching?
3:28
Speaker 2: obviously that is a major source right there, the director.
3:31
Speaker 3: Well, absolutely. So when I got cast to play Anna,
3:36
Speaker 3: I knew right away that she was based on Kim Biddle,
3:39
Speaker 3: who is the founder of a nonprofit called Saving Innocence
3:43
Speaker 3: that has been around since 2010. And so that nonprofit
3:47
Speaker 3: was a huge resource for me, but he had also
3:49
Speaker 3: sent me a lot of information. There's another woman named
3:55
Speaker 3: Rachel Lloyd who does advocacy work with victims of sex
3:58
Speaker 3: trafficking and has narrowed her focus to include young women and,
4:03
Speaker 3: and children. Um, and she wrote a memoir called girls
4:07
Speaker 3: like us, which was just so eyeopening. And she herself
4:11
Speaker 3: was escaped, um, sex exploitation as a teenager, um, and
4:17
Speaker 3: then used that, that trauma and that resilience to become a,
4:23
Speaker 3: have a position of amazing advocacy for women in this position.
4:27
Speaker 3: So I read her memoir. He sent me like a
4:30
Speaker 3: whole list of things. I mean, it was like I
4:32
Speaker 3: was doing my own sort of deep dive. There are
4:35
Speaker 3: a lot of documentaries that really shine a light on
4:39
Speaker 3: human trafficking, I think we also think that this is,
4:43
Speaker 3: this is a overseas problem or.
4:45
Speaker 1: A hundred percent. I was just going to say that.
4:47
Speaker 3: It's not, it's not in our backyard. And, and yet
4:50
Speaker 3: Los Angeles is, was named by, I think by the
4:52
Speaker 3: FBI in 2009 as one of the 13 largest centers
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Speaker 3: for human trafficking in the U S and, and California
5:00
Speaker 3: leads the way, oh gosh, in cases of of children's
5:06
Speaker 3: sex trafficking. So it is a huge problem. And, and
5:10
Speaker 3: these are not, you know, kids in Cambodia or like immigrant,
5:15
Speaker 3: I mean, immigrant populations are definitely vulnerable, but the majority
5:19
Speaker 3: of kids that are caught up in sex exploitation are
5:23
Speaker 3: American citizens here in the U S it's a huge
5:26
Speaker 3: domestic hub and, and the demand is here in the
5:29
Speaker 3: U S.
5:30
Speaker 2: I can't like, I, I, I, We cover so many
5:34
Speaker 2: things on this podcast that are really disturbing, so I
5:37
Speaker 2: find myself saying this a lot. But this in particular
5:41
Speaker 2: is something, I mean, I just covered John Wayne Gacy,
5:45
Speaker 2: and I feel like this is more nauseating and more
5:51
Speaker 2: upsetting than some serial killer behavior, if you can imagine.
5:56
Speaker 1: It's so deeply, deeply disturbing.
6:01
Speaker 3: It's deeply disturbing because you Realize that there are whole swaths,
6:05
Speaker 3: whole segments of the population who are willing to pay
6:09
Speaker 3: people to get what they want based on the most
6:12
Speaker 3: vulnerable sections of our communities. And the numbers are staggering.
6:18
Speaker 3: Like every two minutes a child is introduced into the
6:21
Speaker 3: world of sex trafficking. It doesn't even make sense to me.
6:24
Speaker 3: There are 300,000 children in the U.S. right now who
6:29
Speaker 3: are victims of human trafficking. Say that number again. 300,000.
6:37
Speaker 3: It doesn't even make sense, right? Like when you think
6:40
Speaker 3: of those numbers. And then these children, the average age
6:45
Speaker 3: is 13. The average age, right? So we're talking about
6:50
Speaker 3: children as young as 7, 8, 9.
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Speaker 1: That are being preyed upon.
6:52
Speaker 3: Mm. Mm.
6:59
Speaker 2: Emma, who is the character who gets abducted, she meets Adam,
7:05
Speaker 2: this boy, through her friend Courtney. And Courtney's boyfriend, Johnny,
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Speaker 2: both of these young men are involved in finding these
7:15
Speaker 2: women and abducting them. And Adam ultimately gives Emma the
7:19
Speaker 2: drugged drink. And Emma doesn't even realize that she's in
7:22
Speaker 2: danger until she's already in it.
7:24
Speaker 3: Yes.
7:26
Speaker 2: How common is that kind of scenario in the real
7:29
Speaker 2: stories that you encountered?
7:31
Speaker 3: So the use of psychological manipulation in this case of
7:36
Speaker 3: the idea of somebody befriending a girl, whether it's through
7:41
Speaker 3: the idea of mentorship or creating a relationship maybe online
7:45
Speaker 3: through social media. Unfortunately, a lot of victims of sex
7:49
Speaker 3: trafficking are also sold by their own family members. But
7:55
Speaker 3: in our story, you know, and we say it in
7:57
Speaker 3: the movie, this idea of the Romeo trap where, you know,
8:03
Speaker 3: girls who are in a place where they need and
8:07
Speaker 3: desperately want someone to understand them or support them or,
8:11
Speaker 3: you know, they'll use techniques like love bombing or promising
8:15
Speaker 3: all sorts of things in order to, you know, befriend
8:19
Speaker 3: these young women and then using that to slowly erode
8:24
Speaker 3: these boundaries and then that coercion replaces trust, right? And,
8:30
Speaker 3: you know, we know from all sorts of stories in
8:34
Speaker 3: true crime that that psychological coercion and manipulation is a
8:38
Speaker 3: really powerful mechanism to keep young girls and women trapped.
8:46
Speaker 3: And beyond that, I mean, violence is... use. I mean, these,
8:51
Speaker 3: these women and young children are obviously held against their,
8:54
Speaker 3: their will once, once it becomes, um, their new normal,
9:00
Speaker 3: which is a horrible thing too.
9:02
Speaker 2: That is something that, yes, that you guys cover in
9:06
Speaker 2: this movie, this like very clearly, um, the kind of ringleader, um,
9:12
Speaker 2: played by Olivia Diabo, whom I love.
9:14
Speaker 1: I adore her.
9:15
Speaker 2: Um, you know, she simply says straight away, this is
9:20
Speaker 2: your new life. So you, you have the, you just
9:23
Speaker 2: get used to it. And I thought it was very
9:26
Speaker 2: poignant that the, the one character, you know, she believed
9:31
Speaker 2: Courtney believed that this man loved her. Like she loved him.
9:35
Speaker 2: And even though she's put in this horrific situation in
9:39
Speaker 2: that those first moments where she has to be photographed
9:42
Speaker 2: and she kind of makes that effort to.
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Speaker 1: Put her hand on his shoulder like, you know, Johnny,
9:49
Speaker 1: it's us.
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Speaker 2: I thought you loved me, and sort of thinks she can.
9:53
Speaker 1: Somehow get it back.
9:55
Speaker 2: And it's just heartbreaking, that that understanding that she was
10:01
Speaker 2: that vulnerable and that.
10:03
Speaker 3: Susceptible. Susceptible.
10:07
Speaker 2: So the title itself stolen from the suburbs is, is
10:12
Speaker 2: almost a warning in itself.
10:14
Speaker 1: So was there a misconception that.
10:16
Speaker 2: You had about who gets trafficked or where it happens
10:20
Speaker 2: that was kind of shattered when you started making this movie?
10:24
Speaker 3: I would say that, you know, when I started to
10:27
Speaker 3: do my research, I certainly didn't understand the scope of how,
10:33
Speaker 3: just how many children are victimized. And also, you know,
10:38
Speaker 3: reading especially Rachel Lloyd's memoir, it really shines a light
10:41
Speaker 3: on You know, we are through, you know, our movie,
10:46
Speaker 3: we are using a headline like stolen from the suburbs
10:48
Speaker 3: to it's a sort of an attention grabbing headline in
10:51
Speaker 3: that it makes it feel like this could happen in
10:53
Speaker 3: your backyard. And certainly it does. And it can. What
10:58
Speaker 3: it doesn't necessarily highlight is that the children and young
11:02
Speaker 3: women that are most susceptible are. are coming from other
11:07
Speaker 3: systemic neglect, right? So we're talking about youth that are
11:11
Speaker 3: definitely navigating the foster care system. That is a huge
11:15
Speaker 3: portion of the population that's vulnerable, youth of color, LGBTQ,
11:20
Speaker 3: and then dealing with, you know, unstable homes or domestic abuse, right?
11:27
Speaker 3: So these are all layered elements that are going to
11:30
Speaker 3: further marginalize communities and make, young people more susceptible to
11:37
Speaker 3: being victimized in this way. Yeah. Yeah.
11:43
Speaker 2: Were there any real victim stories that became difficult to shake?
11:50
Speaker 3: I think the element to me that just stuck out
11:53
Speaker 3: in my mind that was just mind boggling to me
11:58
Speaker 3: And the reason why the work of somebody like Ken
12:01
Speaker 3: Biddle and Rachel Lloyd, their work is so very important
12:04
Speaker 3: is because they would talk about beginning their, and why
12:08
Speaker 3: they came into the work that they do. So in 2009,
12:11
Speaker 3: there was a headline about like 52 youth saved in
12:16
Speaker 3: a raid, right? But within this news article, some of
12:21
Speaker 3: the youth were as young as 10 and they were
12:23
Speaker 3: being described as child prostitutes. Which makes no sense, right?
12:28
Speaker 3: So up until the late 90s or early 2000s, the
12:33
Speaker 3: idea of the phrase human trafficking wasn't even necessarily part
12:37
Speaker 3: of the lexicon because there was a misconception that these
12:42
Speaker 3: young girls that were portrayed as older because they're pimps
12:47
Speaker 3: and traffickers to have told them to lie about their
12:49
Speaker 3: age or being picked up in sting operations or what
12:51
Speaker 3: have you. But we're talking about 12, 13, 14-year-old girls, right?
12:55
Speaker 3: who under state law cannot even consent to a sexual act, right?
13:00
Speaker 3: So in any other circumstance, that would be considered statutory rape, right?
13:05
Speaker 3: But because money was exchanged, it's this idea that they're
13:09
Speaker 3: then charged with an act of prostitution and they are
13:13
Speaker 3: being sold by adult men to other adult men that
13:17
Speaker 3: we then call, you know, johns. And those men, these
13:22
Speaker 3: buyers get like a slap on the wrist, right? and
13:25
Speaker 3: go pay a fine or whatever, go off on their way.
13:28
Speaker 3: And then these young girls are being sent to juvenile
13:31
Speaker 3: detention centers instead of being recognized as victims of sex trafficking.
13:37
Speaker 3: It's infuriating.
13:38
Speaker 2: I cannot process that. Because it's so unfathomable. It's like,
13:47
Speaker 2: this is clearly so wrong. And I love that your
13:49
Speaker 2: character says that. When someone calls them prostitutes and you
13:55
Speaker 2: very just clearly say, prostitutes have a choice.
13:59
Speaker 1: These are children.
14:00
Speaker 3: Exactly. So there have been a number of legislation that
14:05
Speaker 3: has come out. And one of them was the Trafficking
14:12
Speaker 3: Victims Protections Act. So that was a federal legislation that
14:15
Speaker 3: came out in 2000. And then slowly... the perception has changed.
14:20
Speaker 3: So in 2008, there was a law that New York
14:24
Speaker 3: State was one of the first states that led the
14:26
Speaker 3: way in terms of not charging minors with sex crimes, right?
14:31
Speaker 3: Treating them as victims. And so Kim Biddle's work and
14:34
Speaker 3: advocacy here in California set the stage. But a bill,
14:39
Speaker 3: there was a bill, the Senate Bill 1322, it didn't
14:41
Speaker 3: come into action until 2017 where they couldn't charge youth
14:47
Speaker 3: with sex crimes.
14:49
Speaker 2: It's crazy because I think that term, child prostitution, it
14:55
Speaker 2: sounds like, oh, right, yeah, right. I've heard that a
14:58
Speaker 2: million times in the past without actually thinking.
15:03
Speaker 1: It's an impossibility, really.
15:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. It's an impossibility.
15:08
Speaker 1: Yeah.
15:22
Speaker 2: So Catherine, who is the character of Emma's mom, goes
15:27
Speaker 2: to the police for help, but ultimately turns to your character, Anna.
15:31
Speaker 2: Did you come across families who faced anything resembling that,
15:35
Speaker 2: kind of knowing that their child was in danger, but
15:37
Speaker 2: struggling to get people to understand.
15:40
Speaker 1: What was happening?
15:41
Speaker 3: Well, that theme is certainly something that is very much
15:47
Speaker 3: based in real life. And one of the resources that
15:50
Speaker 3: the director had sent me was like a it was
15:52
Speaker 3: an A & E TV that back when A &
15:54
Speaker 3: E was, and they had a lot of amazing, you know,
15:58
Speaker 3: true crime documentaries. And one of them was, I think
16:00
Speaker 3: it was called Runaways, but it was about a group
16:03
Speaker 3: of PIs that help parents find their runaways, right? Because
16:07
Speaker 3: there is a ticking clock. The first 24 to 72
16:11
Speaker 3: hours are crucial in order to find a missing child. And,
16:17
Speaker 3: you know, the resistance that, Cynthia Watrous's character gets from, from, um,
16:25
Speaker 3: the detectives, um, from, from law enforcement is very much
16:29
Speaker 3: rooted in the, the uphill battle of, of finding a
16:33
Speaker 3: child once they were taken.
16:35
Speaker 2: I feel like that is, that is happening in a
16:39
Speaker 2: lot of areas just in the last 15 or 20
16:42
Speaker 2: years of, you know, that, that, clock of oh you
16:47
Speaker 2: can't look for a child until x amount of hours
16:49
Speaker 2: because they've just run away you know we're slowly kind
16:53
Speaker 2: of starting to understand that that's not really the majority
16:58
Speaker 2: of the time uh yeah again it's sort of like
17:01
Speaker 2: i can't i can't understand how that isn't i just
17:05
Speaker 2: have a hard time understanding how that has not been
17:08
Speaker 2: a priority from the beginning but yeah Bureaucracy and a
17:12
Speaker 2: bunch of things, I suppose.
17:14
Speaker 3: Right. And that's why they threaded in the very real
17:17
Speaker 3: organization of NCMEC, which is the National Center for Missing
17:21
Speaker 3: and Exploited Children. Exploited Children. Yeah. And so that resource
17:27
Speaker 3: is absolutely their integral as a piece of the puzzle
17:31
Speaker 3: of trying to find missing children. Right.
17:33
Speaker 2: So in your film, once Emma is taken, we see
17:37
Speaker 2: that it isn't just one predator operating alone. There's an
17:41
Speaker 2: entire system that's operating around these girls. So how much
17:45
Speaker 2: of that structure is based in reality?
17:48
Speaker 3: So that is very much based in fact. And, you know,
17:52
Speaker 3: when they sting operations happen and, you know, or maybe
17:56
Speaker 3: there's one child that they find in a crisis situation,
18:00
Speaker 3: maybe they've had a chance to escape or they find help,
18:05
Speaker 3: that child will then often tell law enforcement or point
18:09
Speaker 3: the way to other children being victimized. And that's why
18:13
Speaker 3: some of these sting operations are so very important because it's,
18:20
Speaker 3: a lot of this is done in the shadows. Right.
18:22
Speaker 3: And as, as it's like this, this, this hard element
18:26
Speaker 3: is more like it's shone upon this crime. It, it
18:30
Speaker 3: moves underground more and more. Right. So I think it's,
18:35
Speaker 3: just so important to recognize, you know, the signs of,
18:39
Speaker 3: of coercion or, or having ways for victims to, to,
18:45
Speaker 3: to reach out or find help. It's incredibly important.
18:50
Speaker 2: What's, what's something about the way that trafficking operations work
18:55
Speaker 2: that you had absolutely no idea about before making this film?
18:59
Speaker 3: There are children as young as what, what is talked
19:06
Speaker 3: about in some of these documentaries it's really hard for
19:09
Speaker 3: me to wrap my head around somebody finding any sort
19:11
Speaker 3: of power or pleasure in exploiting young children so I
19:16
Speaker 3: it especially as a young mom now it it hits
19:20
Speaker 3: differently I don't I'm not sure how I would have
19:22
Speaker 3: handled the material at the time if I had been
19:25
Speaker 3: a mom right and would also I think to me
19:29
Speaker 3: what something that gave me a lot of Maybe more
19:32
Speaker 3: optimism or just amazed by the resilience of a lot
19:36
Speaker 3: of these people that are doing advocacy work is how
19:40
Speaker 3: they're able to use what they went through in order
19:44
Speaker 3: to help more victims. I think that that level of
19:48
Speaker 3: strength just astonished me.
19:50
Speaker 2: I have been amazed by that with in particular these
19:54
Speaker 2: sorts of cases, but so many things where people use,
19:59
Speaker 2: you know, you could say it's a choice. Like when
20:02
Speaker 2: you go through some trauma, you either totally go inward
20:08
Speaker 2: and you sort of give up on life or you
20:12
Speaker 2: have the opportunity to keep going and try to use
20:15
Speaker 2: it in a way that's meaningful and helpful to others.
20:18
Speaker 2: And I just feel like that is, I am fiercely
20:22
Speaker 2: moved by that, by the, the, the ability of the
20:27
Speaker 2: human spirit to continue.
20:29
Speaker 1: It's really something.
20:32
Speaker 3: It's also something that really intimidated me stepping into the
20:36
Speaker 3: shoes of this character, because I felt like I was,
20:38
Speaker 3: you know, like an actor emissary for these survivors and
20:43
Speaker 3: for the people behind Saving Innocence because my character's card
20:47
Speaker 3: literally has their name of their nonprofit, right? So I
20:50
Speaker 3: felt like I was really trying to represent what they
20:56
Speaker 3: do and how they're able, just like these heroic men
21:02
Speaker 3: and women who are on the front lines every day. Yeah,
21:06
Speaker 3: it's a huge.
21:08
Speaker 2: It's a really big responsibility, but I feel like, you know,
21:13
Speaker 2: sometimes in this business.
21:15
Speaker 1: You get to do something that's more important than the
21:17
Speaker 1: actual thing that you're doing, you know?
21:20
Speaker 2: And that to me always feels like it's just, it's,
21:25
Speaker 2: it's a great, it's a beautiful thing.
21:29
Speaker 3: It gives a much deeper meaning to the idea of
21:33
Speaker 3: art and what art is for. Yep.
21:36
Speaker 1: And that sometimes, you know, many, Elizabeth Smart has said it.
21:41
Speaker 2: Several, I interviewed Skeet Ulrich because he made her movie
21:44
Speaker 2: about her life. And, you know, she said, you know,
21:50
Speaker 2: when people would ask her, why do this? Like, why
21:53
Speaker 2: tell this horrible story about yourself? You know, and she said,
21:58
Speaker 2: I'm paraphrasing, I'm not quoting Elizabeth. But, you know, essentially the,
22:03
Speaker 2: that sometimes as a society we're able to digest and
22:06
Speaker 2: really empathize and understand something through story rather than a
22:11
Speaker 2: narrative rather than just reading an article somewhere and it's
22:15
Speaker 2: like a way in for us to metabolize and really.
22:22
Speaker 3: Understand and as much as you know the idea of
22:27
Speaker 3: Sydney Sweeney's character, you know, being an upper middle class
22:31
Speaker 3: young woman who looks like Sydney Sweeney, you know, she's
22:33
Speaker 3: absolutely still give this just amazing vulnerable and harrowing performance
22:39
Speaker 3: that we hope, you know, creates this visceral emotion in
22:42
Speaker 3: audiences so that they pay attention. Right. So that's really
22:46
Speaker 3: the most important element of the story is, is, is
22:49
Speaker 3: shining a spotlight on the issue at large. And then
22:54
Speaker 3: people can choose to engage with those facts and, how
22:58
Speaker 3: they can and metabolize that information and then, and then
23:02
Speaker 3: go deeper with it by either supporting organizations or at
23:06
Speaker 3: least being aware as parents, like what grooming techniques exist,
23:13
Speaker 3: you know? Yep. I think one of the things that
23:16
Speaker 3: hit me was, you know, the way that they decorated
23:21
Speaker 3: the sort of the hub for saving innocence in the movie.
23:23
Speaker 3: And you see all of these missing children posters. And
23:26
Speaker 3: I think they were really trying to bring home like
23:28
Speaker 3: there are so many missing kids that haven't been found
23:35
Speaker 3: and are still missing.
23:50
Speaker 2: Were there moments on set when you like everybody, you
23:55
Speaker 2: just needed to decompress after what you filmed or like, how,
24:00
Speaker 2: how was that?
24:01
Speaker 1: Did things stay with you? Are you able to like
24:03
Speaker 1: step in and out of it or?
24:06
Speaker 3: Definitely what stayed with me was the research and, you know,
24:10
Speaker 3: stepping into the shoes of my characters. I also wanted
24:14
Speaker 3: to honor it in a way with Anna where, she
24:18
Speaker 3: brought that trauma with her, but it was also not
24:21
Speaker 3: the focal point of the story, right? It was part
24:23
Speaker 3: of her backstory, but the, you know, the emergency, the
24:26
Speaker 3: crisis at hand was sort of still in the forefront.
24:29
Speaker 3: So it was sort of like trying to, to layer
24:33
Speaker 3: all those elements. I mean, and Cynthia gave such a
24:38
Speaker 3: dialed in urgent performance that it was, it was like,
24:44
Speaker 3: easy to feel the stakes of the story and it
24:47
Speaker 3: felt very real life. And, you know, our, our director,
24:51
Speaker 3: it was also wonderful at keeping the pace and the
24:56
Speaker 3: stakes alive, but also keeping a very like calm and
25:01
Speaker 3: respectful set, you know? Yeah.
25:04
Speaker 2: I mean, it's an incredibly fine line of, you know,
25:11
Speaker 2: reenacting these things and like it's dealing with such difficult
25:15
Speaker 2: subject matter. It's a really, it's a big challenge to be,
25:20
Speaker 2: to figure out how to do those things without being
25:22
Speaker 2: exploitative while still, you know, forcing the audience to deal
25:27
Speaker 2: with difficult things.
25:29
Speaker 1: You know, that's a real, it's a challenge for sure.
25:33
Speaker 2: And I could definitely feel, you know, I didn't know
25:36
Speaker 2: before we started talking that you, that your character in
25:39
Speaker 2: particular was based on a real person, then all those things.
25:42
Speaker 2: And I felt all of the, you just do a
25:45
Speaker 2: beautiful job because it feels very nuanced. It feels very deep,
25:50
Speaker 2: but it feels very grounded without still having the urgency,
25:54
Speaker 2: you know, like your character doesn't have the same emotional
25:58
Speaker 2: response as Cynthia's because it's not your child, but there's
26:03
Speaker 2: still the understanding that you truly get from like the
26:08
Speaker 2: depth of what this is. And that's also, you know,
26:11
Speaker 2: it's kudos to you because that's also not easy to do.
26:13
Speaker 3: Oh, thank you. Yeah. I felt like it was very
26:15
Speaker 3: important for me to, to bring this element of Anna
26:19
Speaker 3: where she is the sort of grounding force within all
26:22
Speaker 3: the elements of, of chaos and the stakes and the piecing.
26:27
Speaker 3: Because this is, this is in some ways her everyday
26:31
Speaker 3: and these, these men and women have to have this,
26:35
Speaker 3: sort of amazing sense of resilience to be able to
26:39
Speaker 3: approach these stories with so much empathy and compassion.
26:46
Speaker 2: Did you, when the movie aired, did you hear from
26:49
Speaker 2: anyone who had actually experienced trafficking or did you meet
26:53
Speaker 2: any survivors before or?
26:55
Speaker 3: I met survivors that have now become, you know, adults, um, uh,
26:59
Speaker 3: certainly through many of the, um, social workers and advocates
27:04
Speaker 3: within saving innocence, um, went to, you know, some of
27:09
Speaker 3: their fundraising events and these, these amazing people told stories.
27:13
Speaker 3: And then we heard, you know, a lot of stories
27:15
Speaker 3: from the special task forces within LAPD that, uh, that
27:20
Speaker 3: are trained to deal specifically in these sting operations and
27:23
Speaker 3: to recover missing children. Um, you know, the sex crime
27:28
Speaker 3: unit and it may, I can't imagine, but there was this,
27:31
Speaker 3: this amazing, you know, synergy, um, between law enforcement and
27:38
Speaker 3: social workers and now, um, the, the, the justice system, um,
27:44
Speaker 3: what struck me was, And how important it is for
27:49
Speaker 3: these elements to all be working together as you realize,
27:52
Speaker 3: you know, a project like Saving Innocence, they're sort of
27:56
Speaker 3: a full, you know, crisis intervention, advocacy, and then restoration
28:02
Speaker 3: services for these young children, right? So get them out
28:07
Speaker 3: of these traumatic situations, but then it's a really long
28:11
Speaker 3: journey ahead where they're there to give constant support, to
28:16
Speaker 3: help rebuild their sense of self and identity and to
28:22
Speaker 3: let them know that they are worthy of being loved
28:24
Speaker 3: and worthy of following their dreams and having a life
28:28
Speaker 3: that they want and to graduate high school and maybe
28:33
Speaker 3: go on to college. So what was incredible to me
28:38
Speaker 3: was these advocates being there for these children who then
28:41
Speaker 3: have to build a sense of courage and trust again,
28:46
Speaker 3: because part of making our community safer is making sure
28:51
Speaker 3: that these buyers and these traffickers get put away. Yes.
28:57
Speaker 3: And so they're layering these charges against them on both
29:01
Speaker 3: state and federal levels. But some of these cases can
29:05
Speaker 3: take four to five years, right? And so these children,
29:09
Speaker 3: once they've built this sense of trust and courage and
29:11
Speaker 3: have a team of people now supporting them, they can
29:15
Speaker 3: face their perpetrators in court. And those testimonies are so
29:20
Speaker 3: integral to building cases against these people so that they
29:23
Speaker 3: go away for a really long time. Right.
29:26
Speaker 2: Gosh, that piece cannot be underestimated, how vital that is.
29:31
Speaker 2: So it isn't just getting the child out of the situation.
29:35
Speaker 2: Everything doesn't magically now go well for this person. No.
29:39
Speaker 3: Of course not.
29:39
Speaker 2: There's so much rehabilitation that is required and so much care.
29:44
Speaker 2: And I'm so happy to know about this organization, which
29:51
Speaker 2: truly was introduced to me because of this film.
29:54
Speaker 3: Always.
29:55
Speaker 1: I love to hear that.
29:56
Speaker 2: I was not aware of this particular organization. So if
30:05
Speaker 2: somebody watches this movie and thinks, terrifying, but this couldn't
30:09
Speaker 2: happen to someone in my neighborhood, what would you say?
30:12
Speaker 3: I would simply say it can. Yeah.
30:18
Speaker 1: That's the sad reality.
30:20
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, yeah.
30:25
Speaker 2: Stolen from Suburbia, or Stolen from the Suburbs, it seems
30:28
Speaker 2: to have two names, is streaming online. Brooke, I'm so
30:33
Speaker 2: happy that I had this opportunity to talk with you.
30:36
Speaker 1: Thank you.
30:37
Speaker 2: We know each other through very happy, happy channels.
30:40
Speaker 3: And connections, yes.
30:42
Speaker 2: Like throwing baby showers at it through very dear friends.
30:47
Speaker 2: I just, I'm so happy to see your face and
30:49
Speaker 2: I'm thrilled to know the depth.
30:53
Speaker 1: Of the work that you're doing here. And I just,
30:56
Speaker 1: I'm happy to know you.
30:58
Speaker 3: Thank you. That means a lot to me. I really,
31:00
Speaker 3: really appreciate it. And I, you know, as an actor,
31:03
Speaker 3: you know, you only hope that you can do work
31:06
Speaker 3: that the whole purpose of it is to shine the
31:08
Speaker 3: spotlight back again on the types of people that are
31:12
Speaker 3: living through the real trauma and overcoming that. And those
31:16
Speaker 3: stories feed into the drama of what we get to
31:19
Speaker 3: put on the screen. So I'm hoping that this story
31:23
Speaker 3: gets continuously seen by people who can open their eyes
31:26
Speaker 3: to the scope of this problem, but also what's possible
31:30
Speaker 3: in terms of supporting organizations that help make it better.
31:34
Speaker 1: Right. Help end it.
31:36
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. All right.
31:38
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Brooke.
31:40
Speaker 3: Thank you. It's great to see you. You as well.