"This book doesn't just fill gaps in film history; it demands that we confront why those gaps existed in the first place. A fascinating read for lovers of film."—Ava DuVernay
The rediscovery of the first film to depict African American affection revises the history of American cinema.
In 1898, vaudeville actors Saint Suttle and Gertie Brown joyously embraced in a short silent film titled Something Good—Negro Kiss. The first known film to portray African American affection, it was lost for over a century until its rediscovery inspired contemporary audiences with a powerful and enduring depiction of Black love. More than a missing piece in an untold history of Black cinematic performance, Something Good—and the magnetism of Suttle and Brown—attests to the power of Black performance on stage and screen from the nineteenth century to today.
In Acts of Love, Allyson Nadia Field tells the story of Something Good and recovers the forgotten yet fascinating lives of its performers and their world. Drawing a vivid picture from sparse historical records, Acts of Love examines popular culture's negotiation of blackness to reconsider the intersections of minstrelsy, vaudeville, and cinema in ragtime America. This book not only presents the story of Something Good, its performers, and the drama of its rediscovery; it shows how the rediscovery of this short early film changes our understanding of American film history.
Allyson Nadia Field is Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Chicago and author of Uplift Cinema: The Emergence of African American Film and the Possibility of Black Modernity.
"A vital contribution to our understanding of early American cinema and a powerful reminder that the work of recovery is also the work of justice. This book doesn't just fill gaps in film history; it demands that we confront why those gaps existed in the first place. A fascinating read for lovers of film."—Ava DuVernay, Academy Award–nominated filmmaker, Selma
"Acts of Love is a revelatory journey into the deep roots of cinematic history. Through the captivating story of 1898's Something Good—Negro Kiss, Allyson Nadia Field's meticulous research and moving narrative of Saint Suttle and Gertie Brown reshapes our understanding of film history and the enduring legacy of Black joy and resilience."—Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University
"Field's Acts of Love centers on a remarkable discovery: footage from 1898 that captures what appears to be the first filmed kiss between an African American man and woman. This seemingly simple act of affection, preserved on celluloid, represents far more than a tender moment between two people. It stands as a testament to Black love, dignity, and humanity during an era when such representations were not merely rare but actively suppressed by the dominant cultural forces of the time."—Julie Dash, filmmaker, Daughters of the Dust
"Exquisitely written and meticulously researched by one of the premier scholars of Black film, Acts of Love is a vital and masterful study of the appeal and rediscovery of Something Good—Negro Kiss. Field's book is a riveting account of the work to identify the film; the lives and craft of the performers; the production, circulation, and reception of the film; and its rich afterlives. This book sets a new and brilliant standard for film scholarship, as Field examines the crucial ways that these 'twenty seconds of affection' provide a crucial opportunity to consider modes of performance, the pleasures of spectatorship, the enduring possibilities of the archival, and the forever complicated relationship between cinema and the world. Her work of detailing the critical, cultural, and historical consequence of the film is a remarkable gift and a stunning provocation for all those invested in the history of American cinema."—Michael B. Gillespie, author of Film Blackness: American Cinema and the Idea of Black Film
"Something Good's capture of a playful kiss on nitrate continues to hypnotize more than a century later precisely because it rebukes the film industry's relentless lust for Black caricature. But Field offers far more than archival recovery; she delivers a brilliant examination of this 'act of love' as a production—its own contrivance, a curation of mundane delight—rooted in the Black communities that shaped its performers and gave meaning to its making. With her insightful treatment of these 'twenty seconds of affection' we find a brilliant archive of Black thought, labor, and desire that compels us to rethink cinema's origins. At a time when media is used to retreat from the novel idea that Black Lives Matter, we need such acts of love as much now as in the film's nineteenth-century moment."—Davarian L. Baldwin, author of Chicago's New Negroes: Modernity, the Great Migration, and Black Urban Life
"With the tenacity of a detective and the vision of a film historian, Field transforms a twenty-second nitrate fragment into a sweeping new history of American cinema. Her groundbreaking work on the rediscovered William Selig's 1898 Something Good—Negro Kiss is nothing short of revelatory. The result is an engrossing, beautifully written history that brings lost performers and stories vividly to life. Like the film that inspires it, Acts of Love is a game changer, restoring what has long been missing from cinema's earliest chapters. A riveting, essential read."—Samantha N. Sheppard, 2021 Academy Film Scholar and author of Sporting Blackness: Race, Embodiment, and Critical Muscle Memory on Screen
"Black intimacy has been hard earned, and privacy has been one of the costs. But a fleeting kiss, captured in the earliest days of American cinema, and later rediscovered in the age of social media, offers another view. Field's Acts of Love tells the story of that kiss, and with it Field brilliantly unearths a history of race and the motion picture industry."—Mark Anthony Neal, author of Black Ephemera: The Crisis and Challenge of the Musical Archive
"Underscoring the resilience of Black love and joy in the face of systemic efforts to suppress them, Acts of Love offers an especially poignant reminder for our present historical moment. Field's meticulous archival work and rich analysis profoundly reframe our understanding of early American cinema and its representations of Black life. A timely, thought-provoking, and compelling read."—Cara Caddoo, author of Envisioning Freedom: Cinema and the Building of Modern Black Life
272 pp.6 x 9Illus: 31 b/w figures, 6 b/w plates
9780520392922$95.00|£80.00Hardcover
Feb 2026