Truth Tellers Theater Ensemble is an intergenerational youth-centered group of creative, thoughtful, and motivated people who come together to collaborate in theater-making to share their stories of lived experience with foster care, kinship care, and adoption.
TRUTH TELLERS THEATER ENSEMBLE TESTIMONIALS 2023-2025
with thanks to the Carlos Vega Fund for Social Justice
Launched in the fall of 2023, Truth Tellers Theater Ensemble is a partnership between Arts Integration Studio and Treehouse Foundation. Each year the Ensemble creates a performance, directed by Priscilla Kane Hellweg, to engage, inform, and inspire others to help make positive changes in the child welfare system.
Strategic storytelling and trauma informed practices focus on myth busting what foster care is – and isn’t, and on fostering life skills through the arts to enable our young people to successfully advocate for themselves.
A series of public performances are given each May for caseworkers and social workers at MA Department of Children and Families, for students in area high schools, for community youth groups, for the general public, and for legislators and arts leaders at the Massachusetts State House.
2025 – 2026: Truth Tellers Season Three is now underway!
Check out our latest interview with NEPM Media Lab, HERE!
2024 – 2025: Worth Standing Up For
In May 2025, Truth Tellers Theater Ensemble performed Worth Standing Up For for the Western Massachusetts Department of Children and Families staff at the De La Luz Divine Theater in Holyoke; as Guest Artists at the Annual Children’s Advocacy Day at the Massachusetts State House, for a filmed invitational performance at Easthampton Media, and for the public back at the De La Luz Divine Theater to close their run of the show.
In the middle of Senate budget week, performers from Treehouse Community’s Truth Teller ensemble, led by Priscilla Kane Hellweg, took part in a Children’s League event at the State House. These artists captured hearts and minds with their stories of childhood trauma, of resilience and survival, of love and trust, and of their dreams for the future. “What is worth standing up for?” they asked. And then they answered, “Anything and everything that interferes with the flow of our heartbeat.”
They were absolutely riveting and utterly grounding in their calls to action.
Senator Jo Comerford
TTTE 24-25 was supported by the Treehouse Foundation and grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council*, Scarlet Sock Foundation, the Beveridge Family Foundation, the Irene E. & George A. Davis Foundation, The Fieldstone Foundation, The Carlos Vega Fund, and TD Charitable Foundation.
*This program is supported in part by a grant from the Easthampton Cultural Council and the Holyoke Local Cultural Council, local agencies, which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.
2023 – 2024: I Was and I Am: Still Here
In May 2024, the Truth Tellers Theater Ensemble performed I Was and I Am: Still Here at Holyoke High School; for the Western Massachusetts Department of Children and Families staff in Holyoke; for Legislators and the general public at the Massachusetts State House, and for a filmed invitational performance at Easthampton Media.
“Truth Tellers offers a world of new possibilities for Western Mass teens. The youth have been able to describe who they are in the context of the foster system. Unsurprisingly, they have beautiful opinions of themselves, and they have strong values in community, safety, and well-being. I am excited to continue to see how they grow throughout this process and what kinds of artistic works they will produce.”
Liz Almonte, AIS Associate Teaching Artist
TTTE 23-24 was supported by the Treehouse Foundation and grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council”, Scarlet Sock Foundation, the Beveridge Family Foundation, the Irene E. & George A. Davis Foundation, the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Massachusetts Afterschool Partnership.
*This program is supported in part by a grant from the Easthampton Cultural Council and the Holyoke Local Cultural Council, local agencies, which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.
