MVFF44: 'Passing' - Conversation with Rebecca Hall, Ruth Negga, Nina Yang Bongiovi

The 44th Mill Valley Film Festival (October 7-17, 2021) presents an on stage conversation with 'Passing' Director Rebecca Hall, Actor Ruth Negga, Producer Nina Yang Bongiovi, moderated by U.S. Indies Programmer and Mind the Gap Manager Faridah Gbadamosi.
Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga deliver their most powerful performances to date in this exquisitely nuanced drama centered on one form of Black resistance to the Jim Crow one-drop rule (“passing as white”), and the complexities of privilege and sacrifice that follow. Director Rebecca Hall’s elegant adaptation of Nella Larsen’s 1929 novella focuses on two former high school classmates, Irene (Thompson) and Clare (Negga), whose chance encounter at a stylish New York City tea salon leads to a rekindling of their friendship, and the realization of how similar and divergent their lives have become. Both are married, well-off, with children, but while Irene is comfortable as a high-class Harlem society wife (often admonishing her darker skinned household help), Clare, passing as white, is married to an unabashed racist and confined to an isolated life of deception and lies. With fine supporting performances from André Holland and Alexander Skarsgård, Hall navigates the terrain of Black identity and skin tone discrimination (colorism) with a masterful hand and compassionate vision. -KD Davis (US 2021, 98 min Director Rebecca Hall )
The California Film Institute invites you to experience the best in US and world cinema at the 44th Mill Valley Film Festival (October 7-17, 2021). Join us for a carefully curated program of the year’s most highly anticipated films, in-theater and online.
For more, visit www.mvff.com and follow Mill Valley Film Festival on social media:
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• Twitter: / mvfilmfest

[@anelcortez2571]

It’s a gorgeous movie. So glad it got made as it got made.

[@LLoveHodgee]

The show Any Day Now also tackles this please watch.

[@b991228]

Did every person who considers themselves as bearing the white label find it alarming that you don’t know how to label yourself? One of the first things I remember in my childhood is the rage people felt toward my neighbors in my wealthy white neighborhood. My neighbors were, nice, fun and wealthy people but they were missing that crucial ingredient. They were not white. Coming to terms of this horrifying childhood realization is something that has affected me for my entire life. Labels with all its myriad of variations can be so vicious.

[@yolisparisi4363]

I like Ruth Negga but I believe you could have done better than using Tessa Thompson

[@paleriedove3333]

Why do you think they could have done better In what way? Meaning do you think they could have someone else to play her character?