“Having seen the movie Hidden Figures, I confess I had a difficult time engaging with the book of the same name. The book often gets lost in its attempt to keep a meticulous account of dates, names, ranks, and the science behind aerodynamics, but is ultimately both a fascinating account of the “computers” that propelled NASA through the space race and an honest portrait of the intersection of employment and society for African Americans in the South during the 1960s.” The film safely straddles the line between a “feel good” movie and providing snippets of the experience of being a black woman in the Jim Crow era, while the book focuses strongly on the complexities of African Americans participating in the fight and advancements of a country and a system that kept them at the bottom rung of American society. “Although the movie was compelling and educational, I preferred the book because the movie inescapably condenses and elides the rich history so thoroughly researched by Margot Lee Shetterly, understandably in favour of a cohesive narrative. In the same year, director Theodore Melfi serves up a film adaptation that brings this story to the big screen. Margo Lee Shetterley (2106) has written a compelling history of the lives of African American women who, as mathematicians in the mid 20th century, played an integral role in the NASA space program. Their first conversation is about Hidden Figures.
In this limited series podcast, Trish O’Flaherty and Alana Skwarok take up the challenge of reading, watching and deciding which medium tells the story better. Which version is better, the movie or the book? We love to compare books and their screen adaptations … plot and people, pace and perspective.