Sweet Christmas! Mike Colter Wows at Rutgers University

On Wednesday, April 5th, 2017 I attended an event with Mike Colter at Rutgers University hosted by RUPA and Rutger’s Geek Week. Mike Colter, most famously known for his current role at Marvel’s Luke Cage, is a Rutgers alumni and spoke to the crowd about his experience at Rutger’s acting MFA program, his career, and making history as Marvel’s first African-American super hero.

Mike Colter has been acting professionally for the last 16 years, and is best known for his roles in “Million Dollar Baby, “The Good Wife”, Marvel’s “Jessica Jones”, and of course the title character of the indestructible “Luke Cage“.

Knowing he wanted to be an actor at a young age, Colter persued his dreams and landed at Rutgers for his MFA in acting. At 20 years old he was the youngest person in his class. The Q & A on Wednesday was conducted by former Rutger’s acting professor and current acting coach Maggie Flanigan, one of Colter’s professors when he was a student.

Although most of the questions of the night revolved around questions about Luke Cage and the upcoming “Defenders” series, Mike Colter also discussed his nostalgia of going to Rutgers calling it “surreal” to be back there.

When asked by a student about what is was like being one of the few African American students in the MFA program (he was one of four), Colter gave advice to the student and aspiring actor, who was also African American, to work hard and explore roles that go beyond race. He inspired the acting students to work hard, and that every actor is alike and different in their own ways. Although he is successful now, Colter was working in restaurants until he was 33 years old (he is now 40) while he worked acting roles on the side.

It’s great to see a Rutgers Alumni being so successful and breaking barriers in television. As a fan of “Luke Cage”, I can now say I’m a fan of Mike Colter the person as well.

About RUPA:
The Rutgers University Programming Association (RUPA) is the university-wide student programming council that serves the entire Rutgers community. We strive to do this by providing a variety of events appealing to the diverse student body on all five campuses. Examples include concerts and comedy shows with internationally known artists, the Annual Homecoming Charity Bed Races, entertaining lectures and performances, art projects, and much more. RUPA was founded in 2005 by combining the programming boards from the then-individual colleges and is now the sole programming association at Rutgers University-New Brunswick.

About Rutgers Geek Week:
Geek Week is an nationally recognized annual week of events celebrating all things “geeky” at Rutgers University. From tabletop and video gaming, to music, cosplay, academic panels based on gender and ethnic diversity, and more. By focusing on the students and their passions, Geek Week seeks to make meaningful differences in students lives by providing opportunities for them to find community, be accepted, and gain exposure to non-familiar topics and experiences in geek culture.