Hi, I'm Eric.

And I'm Brittany.

And this is for colored nerds.

The weekly show where we peel back the layers of black culture that we rarely discuss in mixed

company. So this week on the show, we're talking about the new Netflix film, Passing, starring

Tessa Thompson and Ruth Nega as two childhood friends who reconnect in 1920s Harlem, and one of them

is passing as white. This is a film that is sure to have audiences talking for months,

and today we're going to share our reactions to it

and dig into some of the history behind the real-life practice of passing,

one of the most complex and taboo phenomena in black culture.

Passing, the film based on the 1929 book by Harlem Renaissance author, Nella Larson,

is finally in theaters and on Netflix.

The recently released film version of passing isn't just provocative, unsettling, and captivating.

It's got audiences unpacking their own assumptions about race and color, which is exactly what we're going to get into in this episode.

So we've now both seen the film, and I've also read the book version of passing quite a few times this year

as I worked on an essay that I wrote for Vulture called The Fiction of the Color Line,

where I examine how black women writers have used passing stories to crack our facades of race,

class, and gender. So we are definitely ready to talk about this movie, So let's go. So the story centers on two

childhood friends who reconnect in 1920s New York City. So there's Irene Redfield, played by

Tessa Thompson, who lives in Harlem with her black doctor husband, Brian, played by Andre Holland,

and their two sons. And Claire Kendry, played by Rufnega,

who passes for white and is married to a racist white man, there's no better way to say it,

...