The Greens is a personal story about what happens when a place that defines you disappears.
The story starts with a chance encounter, when a white college kid sits in black barber’s chair. Weary of being pitched a story, Sam rolls his eyes when Teddy asks him to “make a film about me.” But as the two Chicagoans talk they realize they have something in common: Sam and Teddy grew up four blocks apart on Division Street – Sam at a private school in Pulaski Park, and Teddy on the other side of the Chicago River, in the white high rises of Cabrini Green.
Teddy offers to take Sam for a walk down his side of Division, and so begins a journey through time, back into the contentious memory of one of Chicago’s “most notorious” housing projects. As Sam and Teddy walk they exchange memories: insider vs. outsider, news vs. reality. At first their memories seem contradictory, but when the two wander into an old row house their stories start to blend. In the end this documentary about Cabrini Green forces viewers to confront their deepest assumptions about the neighborhood, its residents, violence, and the possibility of finding common ground.
Visit the official website for The Greens.