Passing Strange is a comedy-drama rock musical about a young African American's journey of self-discovery as an artist, while combining strong existentialist and meta-fictional elements (especially self-referential humor).

In an interview with Berkeley Rep, where the play premiered, he said he was initially inspired by reading about the Globe Theatre, where Shakespeare productions were originally performed in front of rowdy audiences.

In the play, the title character utters the following lines: Stew commented that the quote reminds him of a rock musician who tries to attract a girl with his on-the-road stories.

[10] "Passing Strange" played at ACT Theatre in Seattle, WA in June and July, 2014 with LeRoy Bell of "The Voice" in the lead role.

[11] Stew would later work with members of the Beacon School cast where they performed numbers from Passing Strange with him at Lincoln Center.

The Narrator introduces himself as Stew ("Prologue"), openly referring to himself, his collaborator Heidi, and the rest of the band, and occasionally interrupting the plot and interacting directly with the characters throughout the play.

In a late 1970s South Central Los Angeles middle-class neighborhood, the Youth begins searching for "the real" during his teenaged years, having just briefly turned to Zen Buddhism in defiance of his single mother's conservative Christian faith ("Baptist Fashion Show").

Here, he meets the pastor's son and choir director, Franklin Jones, who as a marijuana-smoking closeted gay man, exposes the Youth to drugs, New Negro culture, and European philosophy ("Arlington Hill").

The Youth eventually begins playing guitar, deserts Franklin's choir, and forms a punk rock band ("Sole Brother"), which quickly dissolves during a bad LSD trip ("Must've Been High").

The Youth saves money to travel to Europe where he hopes to truly develop as a musical artist, despite his mother and community's disapproval ("Mom Song / Philistines"), culminating in an argument that satirizes the overly dramatic styles of European experimental cinema and which soon merges onstage into the actual journey to Europe ("Merci Beaucoup, M. Godard").

The Youth can never bring himself to be honest about his background ("Identity"), though he basks in a romanticized African-American stereotype amidst his German friends ("The Black One").

Meanwhile, he is irritated by his heartsick mother's phone calls and delays visiting her, even with Christmas approaching, when the other Nowhaus members abruptly return home to their families.

Charles Isherwood wrote in The New York Times: "Although it is far richer in wit, feeling and sheer personality than most of what is classified as musical theater in the neighborhood around Times Square these days, its big heart throbs to the sound of electric guitars, searing synthesizer chords, driving drums and lyrics delivered not in a clean croon but a throaty yelp...

...Stew, who created Passing Strange, which is an autobiography of sorts, doesn't distract us with exoticism or nostalgia; his story centers on a young black man who discovers his own Americanness while growing up, first, in Los Angeles and, later, in Europe.

[14] Spike Lee's documentary of the play also received a positive review by A. O. Scott in The New York Times: "Here’s the strange thing.

When I saw Spike Lee’s film adaptation, 'Passing Strange: The Movie,' in effect a video recording of a performance identical to the one I’d witnessed at the Belasco Theater in 2008, I was blown away.