Brown & Black

This week Jack and Mike discuss Cardi B's $4 million legal win against gossip YouTuber Tasha K. and what the repercussions are for gossip bloggers and entertainment journalism. Also, the guys talk about the recent racist slurs hurled at Black basketball players in China and how these tensions were manifested in reverse with 'Linsanity'. Are Asians racist of Blacks, is it vice-versa, or is it both?...

Happy 2022 everyone! In this first episode of the new year, Jack asks Mike why America is having a love affair with Disney's animated Colombian film, 'Encanto'. They both discuss why all Disney ethnic animated movies do much better versus live-action ethnic films like 'In The Heights' or 'West Side Story'. What is their success rooted in? The guys explore. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit m...

Happy 2022! We open the year discussing the puzzle that is moviegoers today. Why did they risk their health to make 'Spider-Man: Far From Home' a billion-dollar movie and not 'West Side Story,' 'The Matrix: Resurrections,' or Guillermo del Toro's 'Nightmare Alley'? Plus, we give our take on why public radio is seeing an exodus of hosts of color. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm...

In what feels like a Latino remake of 'West Side Story,' Steven Spielberg brings us a retelling of a classic with new revisions to the Puerto Rican characters. Jack and Mike examine the Latino amendments Spielberg got right and wrong, in particular, the Puerto Rican accents, as well as the bigger meaning of the film for Latinos in Hollywood, and whether Black moviegoers will have a desire or incen...

Happy Thanksgiving 2021! This week Mike and Jack recommend their favorite Thanksgiving movie, plus, they discuss Hollywood's history of transgressions against foreign accents. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, Jack takes an issue with Rosalia and The Weeknd's new song - 'La Fama'. The song is a Bachata from the Dominican Republic, yet neither of them are from there. Is it then cultural appropriation? Mike responds. The guys also discuss writer/director Aaron Sorkin's comments about Javier Bardem's casting of Cuban Desi Arnaz in 'Being The Ricardo's'. Sorkin says, "Spanish and Cuban aren't act...

In this episode, the guys review Rebecca Hall's film 'Passing,' Written, produced, and directed by Hall, it stars Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga. The film is based on the 1929 novel of the same name by Nella Larsen. The title refers to African-Americans who had skin color light enough to be perceived as white, the practice of which is referred to as passing. Jack looks at the film from the Latino c...

It's Halloween and we're talking with Edwin Pagán who is the Founder-In-Chief of LatinHorror.com, a website specializing in Latin-influenced horror. We discuss why Latinos and Blacks love horror movies so much. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For the next 30 minutes, listen to Jack and Mike having a great conversation about the Netflix-Dave Chapelle-transgender issue and what does artistic freedom mean to Ted Sarandos and Netflix? Will this weaken the streaming giant's steel armor? What do people really want from their comedians? They also discuss the top ten films at the box office and what their results say about Americans in 2021, a...

We end our Hispanic Heritage Month series with actor, producer, writer John Leguizamo. He has a new comic book out called 'Phenom X' which is influenced by Latino invisibility and image representation in entertainment and media. This rebroadcast from Sept 13, 2020, has us and John deconstructing the reasons why Hollywood and the news media has a beef with Latinos. Learn more about your ad choices....

Actor and producer Gina Torres joins the show to discuss her new podcast project - 'Princess of South Beach'. It's a 36 episode, modern, bilingual audio telenovela series recorded in English and Spanish that reimagines the telenovela format. Torres is also a producer of her work and she takes Jack and Mike through the good and the bad of being Afro-Latina in Hollywood. And you'll want to stick aro...

We continue our Hispanic Heritage Month series as we rebroadcast our favorite Latinx interviews since the inception of the show. Jack gives Mike his take on Latino invisibility. Also, we are rebroadcasting our interview with Estuardo Rodriguez, who was in charge of getting the government to allow the creation of the Smithsonian American Latino Museum. When the museum is finished, it will be the mo...

In this rebroadcast from June 21, 2020, celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, Afro-Latino children's book author and illustrator, Eric Velasquez, talks to us about the power and context of Afro-Latino images in media and the importance they have in the development of children's self-esteem. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Academy Award nominee Riz Ahmed and Marvel's new 'Blade' director Bassam Tariq sit down with us to talk about their new film 'Mogul Mowgli'. We tackle Muslim identity, the love-hate relationship many have with their family, and their thoughts of Black cultural appropriation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Teresa Hsiao is the creator, writer, and showrunner of 'Awkwafina is Nora from Queens' on Comedy Central. She gives us details about season two of the show, her thoughts on the Asian boom in Hollywood, her approach to doing comedy in 2021, and her disbelief at how Hollywood hasn't already created a Latino wave on screen. Mike discusses directing his new horror film . Jack discusses hosting a new S...

What is at the root of white supremacy? Why do many white Americans fight so hard to preserve it? Why do they defend so staunchly their Confederate monuments? These are questions director CJ Hunt and executive producer Roy Wood Jr. tried to answer with their documentary The Neutral Ground. Part investigative journalism, part comedy, this film explores themes of white supremacy but also being mixed...

This week we welcome director Carlos López Estrada and actor/producer Kelly Marie Tran to discuss their new film collaboration - 'Summertime'. Jack and Mike also explore the importance of spoken word and poetry in cinema. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike and Jack review the MCU's real first lady - Black Widow. Mike then welcomes Dominican musician Yasser Tejeda who discusses his new acoustic EP ' Interior'  and shares how in the Dominican Republic his conservatory did not teach him how to play Bachata or Merengue. Mike explores the topic further in the interview. Tejeda's music is a fusion of Dominican experiences merging the...

Actress and singer Jasmine Cephas-Jones joins the show to discuss her new show on STARZ, 'Blindspotting,' the TV adaptation of the 2008 film directed by Carlos López Estrada starring Daveed Diggs and Rafael Casals. Jack and Mike also discuss the new storytelling trend of spoken word in film and television plus the controversy of the Latinx musical 'In The Heights' which her fiancé Anthony Ramos is...

Jack and Mike are celebrating their 50th episode of 'Brown & Black'! In this episode, the guys reflect back on fifty episodes and how not only did America change but how they changed as well. Then they discuss the Amazon/MGM merger, along with the WarnerMedia/Discovery+ merger too. How will art be affected by the streaming industry and business? And will 'In The Heights' be #1 at the box office? M...

Today we're doing a deep dive into how storytelling shapes, influences and creates our worldview. Jeff Gomez, one of the world's leading experts in transmedia storytelling, has helped build the story universes of famed franchises, IPs, brands such as Avatar, Transformers, Spider-Man, Halo, Splinter Cell, Coca-Cola, Nike, and many more. We also ask Jeff why we are so attracted to dark stories? Why...

The 2021 Oscars had the most amount of diverse and inclusive winners ever... except for Latinos who were invisible once again. Why and how do Latinos fix it? Also, Hollywood is remaking 'Another Round' with Leonardo DiCaprio, which just won the Oscar for Best International Feature. Why does Hollywood need to remake foreign films? What is the cultural and social implications of it? Is it American S...

Why isn't there a Latino movie star? Will Danny Ramirez from Marvel's 'Falcon & The Winter Soldier' be the first Latino movie star in the modern era? From HBO's 'The Affair' to 'Top Gun: Maverick' starring Tom Cruise, what is Ramirez's ceiling? We also discuss why there hasn't been a Latino movie star to crack $100M at the box office. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

According to the American Psychological Association, nearly 50% of Americans say they are anxious about resuming in-person interactions once it is safe. It's been officially diagnosed. Perhaps like Tony-winner Karen Olivo who won't return to "Moulin Rouge!" to protest bullies like Scott Rudin, people don't want to deal with assholes anymore. Also, did you know Reuters will be charging you for the...

Little Marvin is the creator, writer, showrunner and executive producer of Amazon's new horror series - THEM. We discuss with him white rage, the critique of black trauma in storytelling today, a brief history of black homeownership against the backdrop of the "American Dream," and how fear and art are powerful tools in defining reality. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoic...