Last night I saw Michael Almereyda‘s Experimenter (Magnolia) in the subterranean recesses of Washington’s E Street Cinema. About halfway through renowned psychologist Stanley Milgram (Peter Sarsgaard) is speaking with William Shatner on the set of a 1975 TV movie about Milgram’s famous obedience-authority experiment, which happened in 1961. Shatner proudly mentions to Milgram that he planted the first inter-racial kiss in TV history upon Nichelle Nichols‘ Lieutenant Uhura in 1968. I YouTube’d the kiss when I got home, and it should be noted that the vibe between Shatner and Nichols was far from heated. It was an odd theatrical moment, a kiss in a play of some kind with the players dressed in ancient Roman grab, and Shatner made a point of not closing his eyes when he kissed Nichols but glaring at the audience. It’s more than a bit weird. I wonder when the first real inter-racial kiss happened — one in which the couple was experiencing real chemistry and desire.