This book chapter examines the reception of the African-American actor Ira Aldridge’s visit to Stockholm in 1857, during which he performed Shylock in The Merchant of Venice and the title role of Othello at the Royal Theatre. The event caused a very lively debate in the press, revealing a wide range of responses, from the openly racist to the equally openly anti-racist, as well as a conflict between aesthetic norms concerning realism in acting. While reviewers often brought up the question of Aldridge’s blackness, they were deeply divided as to his acting. Moreover, the lines of division cannot be neatly categorized in terms of aesthetically conservative and racist versus aesthetically radical and anti-racist. Instead, some of the most positive responses to Aldridge’s performances are also the most deeply entrenched in racial categorization whereas some of the more hostile ones reject or play down race. Thus, the discussion of aesthetics in the reviews has a complex relation to the sometimes casual, sometimes elaborate referencing of race. In order to discuss this connection, the chapter contextualizes the production from the perspective of changes in theatrical practice, and in particular in debates over the nature of acting in the middle of the nineteenth century.