Can We Talk About This host Jordan Carlos and author Roxane Gay examine the movie The Color Purple by looking at how it was perceived when it came out in 1985, and how it’s viewed in our current cultural climate. Addressing the importance of the film’s ‘firsts’, their discussion highlights its steps in the right direction (real black stories; strong black cast; a black, lesbian story, and adapted from a black novel) while reckoning with the notion that equality and representation continues to be a work in progress.

Making the point that The Color Purple proved black cinema could do well at the box office, they dig into the importance of showing under-represented, multi-dimensional stories to all audiences, and particularly for black viewers who, at that time, almost exclsuively saw black stereotypes on the big screen.