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Event Dates

Friday, October 4, 2024 6pm to 8pm

Goethe Institut Boston View map

Goethe-Institut Boston 170 Beacon Street, Boston, MA

https://bit.ly/3BviyDS
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We encourage visitors to our special exhibition Made in Germany? Art and Identity in a Global Nation to attend a special screening of the film Milli Vanilli followed by a conversation at the Goethe-Institut Boston.

The documentary Milli Vanilli (MRC and Keep on Running Pictures) tells the story of the popular musical duo Robert “Rob” Pilatus and Fabrice “Fab” Morvan. Pilatus and Morvan became fast friends during their youth in Germany, and they shared a similar upbringing and future goal: to become famous superstars. In a few short years, their dreams came true.

 

In 1989, their first album went platinum six times in the United States, and the hit song “Girl You Know It’s True” sold more than 30 million singles worldwide. However, their ascension to success came with a devastating price, which ultimately led to their infamous undoing.

 

Following the film screening, a conversation will take place between professor Alexander Ghedi Weheliye (Brown University) and professor Matthew D. Morrison (New York University). Taking the 2023 documentary as the starting point, their discussion will focus on the role of Blackness and identity-making in the history of German popular music. Milli Vanilli’s late 1980s racialized performance fits into a longer tradition of the performance of Blackness and Blackface in Germany during 1970s and 1980s Eurodisco. In this context, Blackness forms an integral part of how Germany imagines itself in relation to the rest of the world. With the help of sound samples, Weheliye and Morrison will offer insight into issues of cultural appropriation that have plagued popular music in Germany and the United States for decades.

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