Herb Jeffries may be the most famous man you’re never heard of.

In 1938, he was the “Bronze Buckaroo,” America’s first black singing movie star, finally giving black children a hero to look up to. Jeffries sang with the Duke Ellington Orchestra and, in 1942, he had a Billboard hit called “Flamingo.”  He was a television star, western crooner, ladies’ man, and accidental activist. Yet, Herb Jeffries never became the household name many believe he so richly deserved.

Born in a Detroit ghetto to an Irish mother and a Sicilian father, Herb Jeffries is not African-American at all. After his father died in WWI, Jeffries’ mother remarried an Ethiopian jazz enthusiast. Jeffries was heavily influenced by his stepfather’s passion for music, and he knew that his 4 1/2 octave range would be his ticket out.  At 19, Jeffries auditioned for a club owner to play in an all-black jazz band. When the man questioned Jeffries’ racial make-up, Jeffries spontaneously capitalized on his dark Italian features and claimed he was “Creole.” He got the job, but that split decision would stay with him the rest of his life.

Today, at 96 years old, Herb Jeffries is still a mystery. He is celebrated as cinema’s first black Western movie star, inducted as such into several museums, yet he’s really not black at all. Does it matter?

A Colored Life is an in-depth look at the charming, humorous and thought-provoking career of a light-skinned entertainer... that all began with a little white lie.