Passing Strange

Eng. 229

Extra Credit: Passing Strange

March 4th, 2010

In the play turned movie “Passing Strange” the first thing that is intriguing is title itself. At first the idea of “passing” in relation to a person passing off for a race that they may not be completely most likely won’t be taken from the title by most. The title literally is the idea of something being so bizarre that it surpasses even the concept of strange. After getting a brief background on “passing” and how it has and still is being used today in America it changes the meaning of the title. The title changes to the idea that passing is strange in itself. The idea of a person passing for another race is seen as strange in society, yet it has been happening for year and still happens today. The overall effect the title had on me was that the idea of passing was so bizarre that it was in fact passing strange.

The play begins with the youth (the main character of the play) being yelled at to get out of bed by his mother. His mother is ranting in a very stereotypical “Negro dialectic”. In doing this they were trying to show how mainstream entertainment in America often portrays blacks in a very stereotypical manner. The next scene is when the youth and his mother go to church. At first the church was not what most expect to see. The church seemed to be full of blacks that were embracing the ideals of what most would consider a normally white church. All the members were sitting quietly in a bore listening to the preacher preach, but as the scene progresses it changes into, as the narrator states, a “Baptist fashion show”. This is another example of how the play makes a point of the stereotypes people have as assuming that in black churches, especially Baptist black churches, the congregation is suppose to be singing, dancing, and having religious experience. The play makes it seem as all this spontaneously happens when the youth says that he is having a spiritual revelation but as soon as the youth...