Columbia University in popular culture

This is a partially sorted list of Columbia University's representation in various films and television programs.

Film

Movies making reference to Columbia and/or featuring scenes shot on the Morningside campus include:

Scarlett Johansson at Columbia University during the shooting of The Nanny Diaries.

One of the fountains at Columbia University

• 3 lb
• A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy
• Across the Universe
• Altered States
• Anger Management
• August Rush
• Awakenings
• Black and White
• Charlie Bartlett
• Crimes and Misdemeanors
• Cruising
• The Detective
• Enchanted
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
• Everyone Says I Love You
• Finding Forrester
• Ghostbusters
• Ghostbusters II
• Hannah and Her Sisters
• Hitch
• Husbands and Wives
• Igby Goes Down
• K-PAX
• In the Blood
• Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna
• Kill Your Darlings
• Kinsey
• Made of Honor
• Malcolm X
• Manhattan
• Marathon Man
• The Mirror Has Two Faces
• Mona Lisa Smile
• Music of the Heart
• The Nanny Diaries
• New York Minute
• North
• Porn 'n Chicken'
• Premium Rush
• The Princess Diaries
• The Pride of the Yankees
• The Producers: The Movie Musical
• P.S.
• Quiz Show
• Real Women Have Curves
• Rollover
• Simon
• Spider-Man
• Spider-Man 2
• Stay
• Still Alice
• Tadpole
• Ta Ra Rum Pum
• The Rock
• The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
• The Words
• Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
• West Side Story

Music

• The music video for the Fugees' single "Nappy Heads" (recorded in 1992 but not released until 1994) was primarily shot on the steps of Low Library.
• Recording artist Nellie McKay released a song on her second album Pretty Little Head (2006), entitled "Columbia Is Bleeding", alleging animal abuse as part of the practice of animal testing at Columbia University.

Television

Blue Bloods: Characters Erin Reagan (Bridget Moynahan) and her daughter, Nicky (Sami Gayle) attend Columbia University.

• 7th Heaven - Matt and Sarah (Glass) Camden were students here until they graduated just after the 10th season finale.
• Castle - Beginning in Season 5, Alexis Castle becomes a student at Columbia.
• Clark and Michael - In the last episode of the Internet TV show, Clark Duke is accepted to Columbia University but chooses not to go after his and Michael Cera's fictional TV show, "The Family Cruise", is picked up by CBS.
• Community - Jeff Winger attends Greendale Community College after the Colorado Bar Association discovers that his bachelor's degree from Columbia was forged.
• Gossip Girl - In the third season, Blair Waldorf and Serena Van der Woodsen enroll at Columbia University.
• Growing Pains - Carol Seaver attends Columbia.
• House - Doctors Eric Foreman and James Wilson (House) attended medical school at Columbia, while Doctor Martha Masters received her undergraduate degree there.
• How I Met Your Mother - Marshall Eriksen is a law student at Columbia. Ted Mosby becomes a professor of Architecture in the end of the fourth season. In the fifth season, it is revealed that the titular Mother was also a student in the Economics class of the university.
• Law & Order - prosecutor Jamie Ross (later a judge on Law & Order: Trial by Jury) attended Columbia Law.
• Lost - Both Matthew Fox and his character, Dr. Jack Shephard, are Columbia alumni.
• Modern Family - Mitchell Pritchett attended Cornell undergrad and Columbia Law.
• Nip/Tuck - Dr. Erica Noughton, the mother of Julia McNamara, is a Columbia alumna with a Ph.D in clinical psychology.
• Northern Exposure - Dr. Joel Fleishman (Rob Morrow) is a graduate of Columbia.
• Quantico - Senator Claire Haas gave one of her campaign speeches at Columbia's Miller Auditorium in episode 16 of season 1. Her dad was supposedly a Columbia alum.
• Saved by the Bell - Jessie Spano attends Columbia.
• Secret Garden - Kim Joo-won is a graduate of Columbia.
• The Sopranos - Meadow Soprano, the daughter of Tony Soprano, is an undergraduate Columbia student.
• Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt - Kimmy Schmidt attended Columbia on scholarship.
• Weeds - Esteban Reyes attended Columbia.
• The West Wing - Toby Ziegler, former White House Director of Communication, takes a faculty position at Columbia some time after being dismissed by President Jed Bartlett for leaking classified information.
• What I Like About You - Valerie Tyler is an alumna of Columbia, and her sister, Holly, applies to Columbia as well.
• Will & Grace - Will Truman and Grace Adler met in college at Columbia.

Fictitious Columbians

• Carl Luce is portrayed in Catcher in the Rye as a snobby intellectual Columbia College student and former classmate of Holden Caulfield who has the highest IQ at the Whooton School. In Slight Rebellion off Madison, he is the best student at Pencey Prep.
• Grace Adler (played by Debra Messing) on the NBC sitcom Will & Grace is a Columbia graduate.
• Meg Altman (Jodie Foster), in the film Panic Room, is a Columbia University student.
• Andie Anderson (Kate Hudson) in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (2003) graduated from Columbia Journalism School.
• Aqua in Cheetah Girls 3 wanted to attend Columbia, and she makes references to their excellent physics departments.^[1]
• Richard Cooper (Chris Rock), in the film I Think I Love My Wife, held an M.B.A. degree from Columbia; the diploma can be seen hanging on the wall in the character's office.
• Daredevil - The Marvel Comics superhero was valedictorian of his class at Columbia Law School.^[2]
• Jessica Darling, the protagonist of Megan McCafferty's Sloppy Firsts, Second Helpings, and Charmed Thirds, attends Columbia.
• Marshall Eriksen of How I Met Your Mother is a Columbia Law school graduate.
• Dr. Joel Fleishman (Rob Morrow), on the television series Northern Exposure, was a graduate of Columbia.
• Doctor Eric Foreman on the popular Fox medical drama House attended the medical school at Columbia.
• Dr. Stanley Goodspeed (Nicolas Cage) in the movie The Rock holds a BA from Columbia.
• Kim Joo-won (portrayed by Hyun Bin) in the South Korean television drama, Secret Garden, says he graduated from Columbia.^[3]
• Willie Keith, the protagonist in Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny, is a Columbia student when he signs up for the Navy at the beginning of World War II; Wouk specifically refers to the campus, including buildings such as Furnald Hall.
• Tracy McConnell, the titular Mother of How I Met Your Mother, was a Columbia student (studying economics).
• Michael Moscovitz, a character in The Princess Diaries series by Meg Cabot, attends Columbia University.
• Professor X, of X-Men fame, completed his graduate studies at Columbia, where he received his PhD in Anthropology.
• Radhika Rani Mukerji, in the Bollywood movie, Ta Ra Rum Pum, is majoring in music at Columbia University when she meets Rajveer Singh Saif Ali Khan.
• Jamie Ross - a Law & Order prosecutor Jamie Ross and later a judge on Law & Order: Trial by Jury attended Columbia Law School.
• Carol Seaver from the family sitcom Growing Pains (Tracey Gold) attended the university.
• Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) from ABC's Lost graduated from Columbia University Medical Center.
• Grey's Anatomy characters Derek Shepherd, Mark Sloan and Addison Montgomery attended Columbia for medical school
• Meadow Soprano, of the television series The Sopranos, attends Columbia College at Columbia University.^[4]
• Jessie Spano from Saved by the Bell attended Columbia in the show's spin-off.
• Spider-Man/Peter Parker - In Spider-Man films directed by Sam Raimi, Peter Parker attains his powers after being bitten by a radioactive spider at a laboratory at Columbia University (the lab scenes were actually filmed at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles), and later attends the school. Of note, in the comic books, Parker never attended Columbia; he attended the fictional Empire State University, which is based on the real-life Columbia University.
• David Strom, the family's father in Richard Powers' novel, The Time of our Singing, is a physicist at Columbia. (The boys both attend Juilliard School.)
• Will Truman (played by Eric McCormack) on the NBC sitcom Will & Grace is a Columbia graduate.
• Valerie Tyler in the TV show What I Like About You is a Columbia graduate, with a degree in Public Relations.
• Iris Vegan, the heroine of Siri Hustvedt's novel, The Blindfold (2008), is a grad student at Columbia from the Midwest.^[5]
• Mara Waters, a character in Melissa de la Cruz's novel The Au Pairs, decides to attend Columbia rather than Dartmouth.
• Doctor James Wilson on the popular Fox medical drama House attended the medical school at Columbia.

References