CC is featured in filmmaker Spike Lee’s new film, “BlacKkKlansman,” which tells the true story of Ron Stallworth, the first black detective in the Colorado Springs Police Department, who infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan during the 1970s. Stallworth, whose memoir “Black Klansman” serves as the basis for the film, moved to Colorado Springs at age 19. He joined the police force via a cadet program aimed at increasing diversity and, at 22, became the youngest detective in the history of the department.
Members of CC’s Black Student Union play a prominent, if fictional, role in the film, with Laura Harrier of Marvel Studio’s “Spider-Man: Homecoming” fame playing Patrice Dumas. “My character, Patrice, is an amalgamation of people I spoke to who had been in the Black Student Union at CC, as well as influenced by Kathleen Cleaver and Angela Davis,” says Harrier.