"The documentary Little White Lie would be provocative simply for what it says about race and identity...The film is a searing portrait of collective denial - a diagnosis from which Ms. Schwartz doesn't exempt herself." - Ben Kenigsberg / The New York Times

"Little White Lie is a true story and unique in that Schwartz's belief in her whiteness was affirmed by her entire community despite her visibly mixed appearance... [The film] focuses on the nature of family secrets and how the white lie on which hers is predicated remained intact for so long."

- Chase Quinn / Vanity Fair

"One of the most profound meditations on race I've ever actually experienced.  It's great"

- Chris Hayes / MSNBC

Filmmaker LaFilmmaker Lacey Schwartz was raised as a white Jewish child and only later learned the whole truth.

"'A lot of personal documentaries cover secrets,' said Jay Rosenblatt, program director of the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. 'Self-indulgence is a big problem with personal documentaries, but I think the secret in ‘Little White Lie’ kept it from going in that direction — the narrative thrust keeps you engaged.'" - Felicia R. Lee / The New York Times

The film has the slightly (not distasteful) amateur flavor of many confessional documentaries -- a tone similar to that of "This American Life," the influential radio center of the My Strange Story movement. 

"What unfolds throughout this deeply personal documentary is not only a search for identity and a sort of belated coming-of-age, but an ever dynamic relationship between a girl and her mother and father". 

"The journey has Schwartz embracing the truth about her real identity and what it means for her as a woman who now identifies as being black, when she once identified as white." 

- Michele Norris /  NPR

On Tuesday, Dolezal broke her silence, saying she has identified as black since a young age. We host a roundtable discussion with four guests, including Lacey Schwartz, producer/director of the documentary film "Little White Lie"

"Holmes' criterion for festival submissions is great black films, against the grain. Certainly that describes Brooklyn filmmaker Lacey Schwartz's 'Little White Lie', a personal documentary about family secrets and the power of truth-telling."

- A.D Amorosi / The Inquirer

"...what emerges [from the film] is a thoughtful look at the impact of denial and the nuanced ways in which we shape our identity."  - Lauren Duca

Lacey Schwartz, a film-maker who grew up in a white family then discovered that her biological father was black, shares her unique perspective on Rachel Dolezal
 

[Lacey Schwartz] set out to find the truth and along the way uncovered a painful family secret. Her interview begins at 34:34.

EDITORS PICKS - A curated showcase of short films selected by the Atlantic.

Lacey Schwartz has a new documentary film out, “Little White Lie,” about her hidden racial identity

A woman who grows up in a white Jewish family and assumes that her parents are her biological parents. But when she is 18, at Georgetown, she asks the question and gets a surprising answer. - Mick LaSalle

Imagine you spent your whole life believing one thing about who you were, only to discover that it was not exactly true?

Lacey Schwartz comments on Rachel Dolezal

"How a Biracial woman grew up believing she was white." - Jenée Desmond-Harris / Vox Media

"This potent family drama ignites emotional fireworks." - Martin Tsai / Los Angeles Times

This past Monday night's broadcast of Lacey Schwartz and James Adolphus' documentary "Little White Lie," reached the highest rating in 10 years for an Independent Lens broadcast on WNET, according to the New York station.

Over 30 years later, Schwartz, the filmmaker and principal subject of the documentary Little White Lie, recounts her first memory of feeling different.

Karen Gabay and Mr V speak to filmmaker Lacey Schwartz talks about family secrets in her film, Little White Lie.

As a child [Lacey Schwartz] believed her family’s explanation — that her appearance was inherited from her dark-skinned Sicilian grandfather — but when she reaches her adolescence, and her parents abruptly separate, her gut begins to tell her something else.
 

Filmmaker Lacey Schwartz always had the darkest skin in her nice Jewish family. Her documentary Little White Lie reveals the reason for that.