Milwaukee - in Popular Culture

In Popular Culture

  • Milwaukee was the setting of the 2011 film Bridesmaids.
  • Milwaukee was the setting for popular American television shows in the 1970s and 1980s, including Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley. Milwaukee unveiled a life-sized, bronze statue of Fonzie from Happy Days along the downtown Riverwalk on August 19, 2008 to mixed reaction.
  • The comic book superheros Great Lakes Avengers keep their base of operations in Milwaukee.
  • The Futurama episode Love & Rocket has the cast taking a trip to Milwaukee in the year 3002 where it has become known as "The World's Most Romantic City" and "Birthplace of Beer Goggles."
  • In The Simpsons episode Sweets and Sour Marge, it is announced that Springfield, home of the Simpsons family, is now America's 'fattest city', prompting Homer Simpson to shout triumphantly "In your face Milwaukee!" (Actually, in 2002, the year the episode was aired, Milwaukee was not even ranked amongst the 20 fattest US cities according to Men's Health).
  • In the Mystery Science Theater 3000 series finale, Diabolik, the crew of the Satellite of Love survive a crash into Earth, and Tom Servo, Crow T. Robot, Cambot, and Mike Nelson wind up renting an apartment in Milwaukee. The episode ends as they watch the WTMJ-TV Saturday afternoon movie, The Crawling Eye, an in-joke to the first network TV episode of MST3K.
  • Milwaukee appears as a setting under the name Millhaven, Illinois in the later works of Milwaukeean Peter Straub
  • In the 1957 film The Prince and the Showgirl, Marilyn Monroe plays an American performer who overhears, and helps to thwart, a plot to overthrow a European monarch. The discussion she overhears is in German, and the plotters disregard her presence as a "dumb blonde" American, but it turns out she is fluent in German because, as she later explains, she's from Milwaukee.
  • Danny Gokey, from Milwaukee, was the third-place finalist during the eighth season (2009) of American Idol.
  • Milwaukee was one of the audition cities for the 2010-2011 American Idol auditions. The winner of this season, Scotty McCreery, and finalist Naima Adedapo, a Milwaukee native, were also discovered during this audition.

Milwaukee has appeared (or has been depicted) in scenes from a variety of feature films, including:

  • The Hindenburg (1975)
  • The Blues Brothers (1980)
  • Major League (1989)
  • Medusa: Dare to be Truthful (1991) - Milwaukee was Medusa's hometown, movie actually filmed in Los Angeles.
  • Wayne's World (1992) - in which the characters parodied the opening of Laverne and Shirley.
  • Camp Nowhere (1994)
  • Hoop Dreams (1994)
  • One Night Stand (1997)
  • My Best Friend's Wedding (1997)
  • BASEketball (1998)
  • The Big One (1998)
  • Dogma (1999)
  • American Movie (1999)
  • Chump Change (2001)
  • Love Actually (2003)
  • Milwaukee, Minnesota (2003)
  • Mr. 3000 (2004)
  • Dawn of the Dead (2004) - set in Milwaukee, actual filming was done in Ontario
  • 5000 Miles (2006)
  • Chasing Sound: Les Paul at 90 (2007)
  • Michael Clayton (2007)
  • Crossed (2008)
  • The Incredible Hulk (2008)
  • Up in the Air setting based in Milwaukee (2009)
  • Public Enemies (2009)
  • No God No Master (2010 film)
  • Bridesmaids (2011)
  • Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
  • Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

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