Notable Alumni in the Arts

Cable, Mary (1920 - )
Literature
Fiction Writer
'41BC

Cable has published numerous stories, articles and novels throughout a career at The New Yorker, Harper's Bazaar and the American Heritage Publishing Company. Her best-known works are the historical novel Avery's Knot (1981), about the murder of a girl pregnant with a minister's child in 1832, and The Blizzard of '88. Other works include Black Odyssey: The Case of the Slave Ship Amistad (1971) and Lost New Orleans, which won the 1980 Louisiana Library Association Award. She has received support from the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities.


Cagney, James (1899 - 1986)
Film, Theater
Actor
'18CC

After his father's death, James Cagney supported his family by performing in musical comedies; his talent quickly led to starring roles in film. The Public Enemy (1931) earned Cagney a reputation as the quintessential gangster, though Cagney's favorite role, for which he won an Oscar, was song-and-dance man George M. Cohan in Yankee Doodle Dandy. Cagney earned a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Angels with Dirty Faces and was the first actor to receive the American Film Institute's Life Achievement Award in 1974. Learn more.


Carter, Holland
Visual Arts
Art Critic
'03GSAS

Holland Cotter became a staff critic for the New York Times in 1998, following a long career as a critic and editor for Art in America, Art News, and New York Arts Journal. Much of his criticism covers art in New York City's five boroughs. Carter has also introduced readers to non-western art and culture, including the first waves of new art from China and contemporary Indian art. At Columbia, he studied Sanskrit and taught Indian and Islamic art as part of an M. Phil in early Indian Buddhist art. Carter also holds an A.B. in poetry from Harvard and an M.A. from CUNY in American modernism. In 2009, Carter's coverage of art in China helped him win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. He has served on the board of directors of the International Association of Art Critics.

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Casey, Edward Pearce (1864 - 1940)
Architecture
Architect
1886, 1888CC

Casey designed a number of notable buildings in Washington DC, including the National Library building (1896), the Congressional Library (1892-1897), the Memorial Continental Hall, the Connecticut Avenue Viaduct and the Memorial Bridge spanning the Potomac River. A veteran of the Civil War, Casey designed the New York state monuments at Antietam and Gettysburg. Casey's General Grant monument on the mall in Washington is one of the largest groups of statuary in the world; at its unveiling in 1902, The New York Times recognized the work as "the most ambitious piece of architectural statuary ever attempted in this country." Casey served as Vice President of the Beaux Arts Society, Treasurer of the Architectural League, and as a member of the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. Learn more.


Casey, Rosemary (1906 - 1976)
Theater
Playwright
'26BC, '29GSAS

Casey was a pioneering female playwright. Several of her plays appeared on Broadway in 1940s and early 1950s. The Velvet Glove (1949) was produced on television as "The Play of the Week," starring Helen Hayes, and earned Casey the Roman Catholic Missionary Organization's Christopher Award. Queen Mary attended the London opening of Mary Goes to Sea. Other works include Glass Houses, Love Is Not Important, All the News, Once and Actor, and The Saint's Husband. Casey was named a trustee of Barnard in 1951. Learn more.


Caulfield, Joan (1922 - 1991)
Film, Theater
Actress
'40BC

Caulfield started out as a cover girl and fashion model. Her fourteen-month run in Broadway's Kiss and Tell (1943) landed her a contract with Paramount Pictures and launched her Hollywood career. While her films made the most of her beauty, Caufield was driven to be more than "just a decoration" on screen. Her films include Monsieur Beaucaire (1946) with Bing Crosby, Blue Skies (1946) opposite Bob Hope, and Dear Ruth (1947) with William Holden. During the 1950s she co-starred in the CBS sitcom "My Favorite Husband" and NBC's "Sally." Learn more.


Cerf, Bennett Alfred (1898 - 1971)
Literature
Publisher, Author
'19CC, '19JS

After joining the publishing firm of Boni and Liveright, Cerf purchased the Modern Library subsidiary. With partner Donald S. Klopfer, Cerf expanded and revitalized the series, adding masterpieces from Tolstoy and Hugo and establishing an affordable canon of literature. In 1929, Cerf and Klopfer incorporated under the name Random House and began publication of a "random" variety of work. The firm's reputation grew with the addition of the works of O'Neill, Faulkner, Proust, Joyce and Gertrude Stein in the 1930s. What began with a $215,000 investment in 1925 was worth $40 million when the partners sold Random House in 1966. Learn more.


Chapman, John Arthur (1900 - 1972)
Literature, Theater
Journalist, Author, Drama Critic
'19CC

Chapman studied briefly at Columbia before joining the fledgling New York Daily News in 1920. The paper dubbed him a "jack-of-all-newspaper trades and a master of all of them." Chapman worked as a photographer in Paris, covered Broadway, and succeeded Ed Sullivan as the Hollywood correspondent for the Daily News. Throughout twenty-five years as drama critic, Chapman was widely known as "Mr. Theater," "Old Frost Face," and "Mr. Curmudgeon." His column, "Mainly About Broadway," was one of the city's most widely read features. Chapman served as the president of the New York Drama Critics Circle from 1949 to 195 and edited Best Plays and the Yearbook of Drama in America from 1947 to 1953. Learn more.


Chen, Yi (1953 - )
Music
Composer
'93SOA

In 1986, Chen Yi became the first woman to receive a master's degree in composition in China. Her Chinese Myths Cantata (1996) was performed in the United States as a full evening, multimedia presentation of her work. She is a recipient of the Charles Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (2001-04) and a professor at the Conservatory of the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Ms. Chen's compositions include Ballad, Dance and Fantasy (written for Yo-Yo Ma); Spring in Dresden, a violin concerto written for Mira Wang; Si Ji (Four Seasons); The Han Figurines; and Ji-Dong-Nuo, commissioned by Carnegie Hall for Emanuel Ax. Learn more.


Cholodenko, Lisa (1964 - )
Film, Television
Screenwriter, Director, Actress
'98SOA

Cholodenko's study under Milos Forman yielded two well-received short films, Souvenir (1994) and Dinner Party (1997). Her debut feature film, High Art, an examination of sexuality and ambition, won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. Cholodenko directed episodes of NBC's series Homicide: Life on the Street and HBO's Six Feet Under while developing Laurel Canyon (2002), which starred Christian Bale and Kate Beckinsale and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2004, Cholodenko directed Aidan Quinn, Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon in Cavedweller. Learn more.


Chotzinoff, Samuel (1889 - 1964)
Music
Pianist, Music Critic
1908CC

Russian immigrant Samuel Chotzinoff left college to accompany violinist Efrem Zimbalist and sopranos Alma Gluck and Frieda Hempel. Chotzinoff was a music critic for the New York World and the New York Post, though he was better known for his work in television and radio. As a Music Consultant and General Music Director at NBC Radio, Chotzinoff helped create the NBC Symphony Orchestra and fostered Italian maestro Arturo Toscanini's return to America. Chotzinoff organized the NBC Television Opera Theater and commissioned the first television opera, Gian-Carlo Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors, which premiered on Christmas Eve in 1951. He published two memoirs as well as Toscanini: An Intimate Portrait (1956) and A Little Night Music (1964). Learn more.


Cincotti, Peter (1983 - )
Music
Composer, Singer, Pianist
'05CC

At age three, Peter Cincotti was playing piano; by age nine, he was composing; and by age twelve, he was playing professionally throughout New York. At eighteen, Cincotti became the youngest performer to headline at the Algonquin Hotel's Oak Room. Cincotti caught the attention of his idol, Harry Connick, Jr., and in 1997 was invited to New Orleans to study with Ellis Marsalis. Cincotti toured with Connick in 1999, winning a prize at the Montreaux Jazz Festival in 2000. His self-titled debut in 2003 made him the youngest musician to ever top Billboard's traditional jazz chart. Cincotti played Frank Sinatra in Broadway's Our Sinatra (2001) and he acted in the Bobby Darin biopic Beyond the Sea. Learn more.


Clurman, Harold (1901 - 1980)
Theater
Director, Critic, Author
19-21CC

In 1931, Harold Clurman founded the Group Theater, intending to counter the current of commercial theater. The Group Theater brought together actors Lee Strasburg and Stella Adler and playwrights Clifford Odets and Irwin Shaw, and Clurman used the Theater to introduce the methods of Russian director Constantin Stanislavsky to the American stage. Clurman went on to direct the works of Arthur Miller, Jean Anouilh, Eugene O'Neill and Tennessee Williams on Broadway. He published criticism in The New Republic and The Nation, and in 1972 his On Directing became a widely read text among students and theater practitioners. He was a professor of playwriting at Hunter College for nearly ten years, and lectured at UCLA and UC Berkeley. Learn more.


Cobb, Vicki (1938 - )
Literature
Children's Nonfiction Writer
'58BC, '60GSAS

Cobb has published over sixty educational books for young audiences, seeking to entertain and captivate the uninitiated science reader. Cobb served as host and principal writer of the television series The Science Game, which won the Cable Television Award for best educational series in 1973. Four of her titles won the Children's Book Council-NSTA Outstanding Science Trade Books for Children award. The Library of Congress named three of her books as Children's Book selections: More Science You Can Eat (1979), How to Really Fool Yourself: Illusions for All Your Senses (1981), and The Monsters Who Died (1983). In 1984, The Secret Life of School Supplies: A Science Experiment Book-won Cobb the Washington Irving Children's Book Choice Award. Learn more.


Cohen, Leah Hager (1967 - )
Literature
Author
'91JRN

Leah Hager Cohen is a writer of fiction and non-fiction. She is best known for her debut work, Train Go Sorry: Inside a Deaf World (1994), which was based in part upon her own experiences growing up at her father's school for the deaf where he was superintendent. She has also written three novels, including House Lights, and is currently working on a fourth. Learn more.


Condon, Bill (1955 - )
Film
Screenwriter, Director
'76CC

Condon's first screenwriting effort was Strange Behavior (1981), a collaboration with Michael Laughlin, which developed a cult following and led to the unofficial sequel Strange Invaders (1983). His directorial debut was 1987's Sister, Sister. In 1998, he adapted and directed Gods and Monsters, starring Ian McKellan and Lynn Redgrave, which won Condon the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Condon's adapted screenplay for Chicago was nominated for an Academy Award and film won six Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Condon also wrote and directed Kinsey, starring Liam Neeson, about the pioneering sexuality researcher. Learn more.


Coonrod, Karin (1953 - )
Theater
Stage Director
'88SOA

Karin Coonrod is the founding director of Off-Broadway's Arden Party and has directed over 20 of its productions, including Love's Labour's Lost, Waiting for Godot, Antigone, The Threepenny Opera, and Victor of Children Take Over, for which she received Encore's Outstanding Director Award. As Artist in Residence at the Public Theater from 1995-1996, Coonrod directed Henry VI, Parts I & II for the Public's New York Shakespeare Festival. She has also directed at the American Repetory Theater. Learn more.


Corigliano, John (1938 - )
Music
Composer
'59CC

In 1964, Corigliano's chamber music piece Sonata for Violin and Piano took a prize at Italy's Spoleto Festival. Under the mentorship of Leonard Bernstein, Corigliano worked on the Young People's Concerts series and composed Etude Fantasy and Clarinet Concerto. Corigliano's score for the science fiction film Altered States (1981) won an Academy Award nomination and his work on The Red Violin (1999) earned him the Oscar for Best Original Film Score. Symphony No. 1 won him a Grammy Award for Best New Composition and the Grawemeyer Award. Corigliano's first opera, The Ghosts of Versailles, won him Composer of the Year at the International Classical Music Awards. Symphony No. 2, a piece for a string orchestra commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, won him the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 2001. Learn more.


Corliss, Richard Nelson (1944 - )
Film
Critic
'74SOA

Corliss became editor of Film Comment in 1970, a position he held for nearly 20 years. He spent three years as film critic for the New Times (1975-1978) and then five years as the associate editor of Time Magazine (1980-1985), where he remains a senior writer. Corliss served on the selection committee for the New York Film Festival from 1971 until 1978. Corliss has edited books on American screenwriting and written a biography of Greta Garbo (1974) and a monograph of the novel and film Lolita (1994), among other works. Learn more.


Corthron, Kia (1961 - )
Theater
Playwright
'92SOA

Shortly after completing her MFA, Corthron received her first commission from Chicago's Goodman Theater for the play, Seeking the Genesis. Fourteen of Corthron's twenty-two plays were commissioned by companies such as Playwrights Horizons (Life by Asphyxiation, 1995), The Public Theater (Suckling Chimera, 1998) and the Royal Court Theater in London (Breath, Boom, 2000). Corthron's plays explore social and political issues, such as police brutality, the death penalty and environmental policy. She has received support from the Kennedy Center, the NEA/TCG Theater Residency Program for Playwrights and the Van Lier Fellowship. Learn more.


Croce, Arlene (1934 - )
Dance
Critic
'55BC

Croce has long been regarded one of the most articulate authorities on dance in America. As founding editor of the Ballet Review, Croce established herself at a time when the field was exploding with change. In 1973, Croce began her 25-year career at The New Yorker, where she chronicled George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp and Mikhail Baryshnikov. Her works of criticism include Afterimages (1977), Going to the Dance (1983) and Writing in the Dark, Dancing in The New Yorker (2000). Croce has served as a panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts. She continues to write as a freelance critic. Learn more.


Crown, Alfred W. (1910 - 1984)
Film, Theater
Producer
CC

Crown made his name producing for Broadway and Hollywood. He co-produced The Deputy, which enjoyed three hundred and sixteen performances over ten months at the Brooks Atkinson Theater in 1964. Crown also produced three works on film: Hamlet (1964) starring Richard Burton, Last Summer (1969), and Taking Off (1971). Learn more.


Crudo, Richard (1957 - )
Film
Cinematographer
'91SOA

Many of Crudo's credits as cameraman, camera op, steadicam assistant and panaglide assistant predate his studies in the Film Division of the School of the Arts. Crudo has worked on the crews of films such as Raising Arizona (1987), Field of Dreams (1989), Ghostbusters II (1989) and Joshua Tree (1993). He has worked as a cinematographer on more than twenty films, including American Buffalo (1996), Music from Another Room (1998), Grind (2003) and Brooklyn Rules (2005). His work as cinematographer and director of photography includes American Pie (1999) and Out Cold (2001). Learn more.