Harvard’s presence in Hollywood is nearly as old as Tinseltown itself, yet the uneasy alliance between the country’s most prestigious academic institution and the nexus of mass entertainment is fraught with a singular tension: Can a highbrow university and a pop culture world just get along?
UNIVERSAL/NEAL PETERS COLLECTIONThe shark and its first victim (cue cello) in Jaws (1975), directed by Steven Spielberg; Peter Benchley, a third-generation Harvardian, wrote the novel and screenplay, but criticized Spielberg’s work.The industry that took shape in the years that followed, with its corporate suits salivating over the vast commercial potential of movies, would redefine Harvard’s relationship with Hollywood. No longer was the entertainment industry the escape route for misfits, rebels, and iconoclasts. By the 1990s, many more conventional graduates were abandoning Wall Street for Hollywood, making just as much money and, very likely, having a lot more fun. Producer Thomas Werner made billions for the television networks with landmark shows such as Roseanne and The Cosby Show. David Heyman had the foresight to option J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, launching the most lucrative movie franchise of all time. Today’s executive suites are lined with Crimson: Michael Lynton of Sony Pictures, Alan Horn at Warner Bros., at NBC Universal, Sumner Redstone at Viacom.
Perhaps the most successful manifestation of Harvard’s new presence in Hollywood is The Simpsons, executive produced by Lampooners Michael Reiss and Al Jean, with decades of Lampoon alums on its writing staff. Four hundred episodes and one feature film later, the animated show deftly synthesizes highbrow and lowbrow sensibilities. This approach, in which an obscure Harvard reference can commingle with a Britney Spears parody and a fart joke, has come to define much of mass entertainment for the past 15 or so years. Its current paradigm may be independent producer Michael Hirschorn, the former executive vice president of programming and production for VH1 who developed raunchy shows such as Flavor of Love and America’s Most Smartest Model but also writes cultural commentary for The Atlantic—a high-low balance that simply didn’t exist 20 years ago.
Ten years ago, Matt Damon—yet another dropout—and Ben Affleck won an Academy Award for their Cambridge-set screenplay Good Will Hunting, which further burnished the Harvard brand. But People’s “sexiest man alive” isn’t really the most appropriate poster boy for Harvard’s still-awkward presence in Hollywood. That would be Bart Simpson, the smart-ass kid with a slingshot aimed straight at Principal Skinner.
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