Crackhouse Documentary
Denisha Cerniglia
High on Crack Street: Lost Lives in Lowell is a 1995 American documentary film directed by Richard Farrell, Maryann DeLeo and Jon Alpert. It was a co-production of HBO and DCTV, produced by Farrell, DeLeo, and Alpert. It aired on HBO as part of its series America Undercover. The documentary takes place about 20 miles northwest of Boston in the economically depressed former mill city of Lowell, Massachusetts.
Once the United States' first planned textile town, Lowell fell on hard times after the mills' relocation to the South. Local computer company Wang Laboratories brought some prosperity in the 1970s and 1980s, but its closure in the 1990s caused a significant reversal. As a result, most of the population was left unemployed or impoverished.
Brenda, a prostitute, contemplates abortion after learning she is pregnant, with the father implied to be either on-again-off-again boyfriend Mike, or Boo Boo, whom she says has been pimping her out. Whatever money she earns is spent on drugs, while a conversation with her parents leads to her abandoning an attempt at detox rehab for the baby. It is later revealed that Brenda's parents forced her to have an abortion at fifteen, leaving her feeling like she murdered the child.
While she eventually does go into detox, Brenda loses the will to complete the program and walks out, as she had six times before. She later goes missing, prompting a panicked Boo Boo to file a missing person's report. The police eventually locate her but do not tell Boo Boo her location per Brenda's wishes, only that "she's had the child and straightened her life out."
Dicky, a once-promising boxer most famous for going up against Sugar Ray Leonard in 1978, struggles to make a comeback. For the sake of his young son, he tries to prevent his habit and the crimes he commits to feed it from destroying his life. He ultimately ends up being arrested on felony charges. While awaiting trial, his mother sets out to raise $5,000 in bail money at a local VFW benefit. A fight breaks out between spectators during the event, and the bail is not raised.
Boo Boo starts shooting cocaine intravenously. After testing positive for HIV, he starts turning his life around by getting a job as a deliveryman for a donut shop and reconnecting with his family. His efforts are undone when a traffic violation leads to the revelation that he was driving with no license, which leads to him being unemployed. He meets with Dicky on his last day out before going to jail, the two of them getting high together. In a final interview, Boo Boo reflects on how he is the only one of the three left and hopes Brenda is doing well with her new life.
A textual epilogue reveals that Boo Boo still lives in Lowell with a crack habit that costs $200 per day, Dicky is eligible for parole in four years, and Brenda died from an overdose before the film's release.
A fictionalized version of the documentary is featured in the 2010 feature film The Fighter, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture. In the film, the documentary is titled Crack In America. Eklund, portrayed by Christian Bale, is shown smoking crack and being high throughout, telling his family that the HBO camera crew are filming him making a boxing comeback. Bale won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his portrayal of Eklund.
Ever since he could talk, Cameron has been telling stories of his life on Barra, a remote island in the Outer Hebrides, some 220 miles from his current home in Glasgow. He describes in detail his chil...
This ESPN 30 for 30 special examines the tragic events that took place on the 15th of April 1989, the Hillsborough Stadium disaster which resulted in the deaths of 96 people and 766 others being injur...
Canada, under the leadership of Justin Trudeau, has positioned itself as a global advocate for progressive policies. In my latest documentary featured in The Telegraph, I embarked on a journey to the...
Ex-crack-head Carl John revisits his home city of Liverpool to make a documentary about how this terrible drug is destroying the lives of people he knows. We see prostitutes and shoplifters and pregnant hookers in action and people smoking crack and what kind of places they inhabit.
So come on up here on the porch of this old house, it sure ain't no home. More like Grand Central Station with all the people coming and going. People laughing, people crying, people just hanging out--no matter the temperature. Guy standing on the porch in zero weather hugging his elbows--people wonder what's the matter with him?
He could use that coat indoors: crack houses usually about as cold as they are bare. Electricity and gas . . . luxuries. No electricity equals no stove, no cooking, no TV, no popcorn. No hot tea. No ice tea. (No ice.) No phone ringing. Lots of fast food wrappers laying around or maybe crammed into a box or trash can, not that anyone ever empties it.
The couch sits squat to the floor instead of on its legs, sure sign where the decorator found it, in the dump. Also a table for important items: a glass stem, hollow like a straw, or maybe a metal one--these are your "pipes"--and a full Bic lighter, some empty Bics, a box of Chore Boy steel wool (for filters).
A candle for when the sun's gone and the Bics are empty. Matches for the candle so the Bics aren't wasted. Broken hangers or car antenna for cleaning out the pipes. No clocks, don't need them. Crack time is when's my next hit.
Come on in a little further. There's probably a hall, empty condom package on the floor, and here's a kitchen. The table is bare except for razor crumbs from cutting or shaving the rock, too small to see though though sure enough they'll be somebody down under that table on all fours looking. Maybe two or three of them.
An empty plate, an empty baggy box. An empty refrigerator if there is one. Empty cupboards, empty shelves, it's an empty place. On those occasions where it is somebody's home, it's almost empty and on its way to being trashed, gutted, shot up, busted out, and the occupant maybe beaten, maybe prostituted, maybe evicted--at least one of those, only a matter of time. That's because a crack house is nothing more'n a temporary site with one sole purpose: money.
The more crack sales, the hotter the spot and the hotter the spot, the more faces you see, 10 or 15 people milling around at any one time. The hotter the spot, the more risk; the more risk, the more precautions necessary, which leads to the first player:
The Doorman--the one responsible for the door. Who is it? Say it's you. You don't leave your post without consent. After a couple of days you get pretty funky. You're a geeker (hooked smoker) and your wage is crack. And you get plenty extra on the sly, too, as middle man, breaking crumbs off other people's dope. Till you get caught.
So comes a knock and you open your door and your customer comes in. You ask them what they want. They tell you 20. Or 25 or 30 or 40...dollar amounts, a quarter rock ($25) being about this [ ] size and a little thicker, though not always. You take this money and count it and turn around and walk off in back to:
The Dopeboy--the main man, dopeman, the dealer, who does not want to be seen (hence the Doorman). Dopeboys travel in packs, three, four, five or six of them, for fear of being robbed. Each has his own stock--they're just together for security--and they take turns at the crack house, the balance hanging out in a "Safehouse" somewhere, a temporary and quiet abode, in this town usually on the north side in the university area or northwest along the park.
Called dopeboys because that's what they are, on average from 16 to 22 years old. I've seen them as young as 14, and rushers can be in grade school, 11 and 12 year olds. I know this 8 year old running for his folks, which is smart. You think they send an 8 year old to jail?
Back to the man. You, Doorman, hand him, the Dopeboy, the customer's money, and he hands you the dope and back you go to the customer at the door. He examines the product and nine times out of ten he ain't satisfied.
You repeat the routine, and more often than not the Dopeboy will give back the same piece of dope or one smaller, which you return to the customer and he complains. But as negotiations do not appear to be going his way, he takes it.
A frequent variation: Doorman breaks off a little bit on his way back to the customer, like maybe a $5 hit. Customer may or may not notice this little premium. Now if that customer is me--I know what's happening--Doorman hands me that tampered rock I say, No, man, give me back my money if he can't do better than that.
So he steps out of sight, puts back the piece he took off, and brings it back to me. I usually laugh and take it, but there have been times I said no again. Then he has to take it back to the Dopeman broken up. That's where some serious ass-kicking comes in. Hey, I'm smoking, you really think I give a shit after the sonofabitch tries to rip me off?
The Hit Man--a necessary feature. He guards the Dopeboy's back, his 44 magnum never far from reach. You meet that muzzle at the door, you've got no illusions the dopeboys are playing around. Believe me, they're not playing. Shoot first, ask questions later, after they pack up and find another spot. Where it starts up again, and goes on all night, all next day, twenty-four/seven.
The Rushers--the ones who run up to any and every car or even to ordinary people passing by: Hey, you looking? Come on, I'll get you hooked. Usually there's four or five of them, yelling and haggling and just rushing the shit out of the poor customer--he gives his money away just to get them out of his face! They'll rush anyone. I've seen these assholes run up to the wrong car and get cuffs slapped on them--comical as hell. These suckers get a $20 piece for every $100 they take to the Dopeman.
So the Dumb-ass gives the Fake Rusher his money, so he goes in and buys a piece and goes out a different door while Dumb-ass just sits, and then you see him circle the block about a hundred times and all you can do is shake your head and laugh. Funny part is, the s.o.b. fakers never get caught. I call them Free Smokers.
64591212e2