Videos of Starring Math for Educators
Bring math to life and delve into the lives and contributions of famous mathematicians with Starring Math, MoMath’s online event series that explores the real math behind popular and award-winning biographical films about mathematicians. To dissect each film, Dr. Steven Strogatz — MoMath’s Distinguished Visiting Professor for the Public Dissemination of Mathematics and Cornell University’s Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of Applied Mathematics — is joined by an assortment of the films’ writers, directors, mathematics advisors, or other film experts, in a dynamic and enlightening session.
Featuring Dave Bayer, Sylvain Cappell, and Alex Kontorovich |
Featuring Tatiana Camacho, Tom Musca, and Thomas Valdez |
Featuring Manjul Bhargava, Matthew Brown, and Ken Ono |
Available Videos
The Starring Math programs currently available for your class include discussions of the following films:
A Beautiful Mind
A discussion of the film A Beautiful Mind featuring professors Sylvain Cappell (New York University), who had many conversations with John Nash over the years and advised director Ron Howard on the making of the film; Dave Bayer (Columbia University), who was the film’s math consultant and the mathematical hand model for Russell Crowe; and Alex Kontorovich (Rutgers University), who worked with Nash near the end of his life, when Kontorovich was an undergraduate at Princeton.
Stand and Deliver
A discussion of the film Stand and Deliver featuring Tom Musca, the producer and co-writer of the film, and Tatiana Camacho and Thomas Valdez, former students of Jaime Escalante (the subject of the film).
The Man Who Knew Infinity
A discussion of the film The Man Who Knew Infinity featuring director and writer of the film, Matthew Brown, as well as two great mathematicians, Fields Medalist Manjul Bhargava and University of Virginia Thomas Jefferson Professor of Mathematics and Chair Ken Ono (both were associate producers and math consultants on the film).
Group Pricing
These recorded sessions are available for purchase to watch directly in your classroom:
- One video: $95
- Two videos: $175
- All three video sessions above: $225
Upcoming Starring Math sessions will be available at a cost of $75 per each additional video, and will be posted to this webpage when they become available. Contact videos@momath.org with any questions.
Please note that the films themselves are not available to stream from MoMath, but can be found on many streaming services or at your local library.
Group-Purchaser Viewing Rights
MoMath’s video recordings are meant to be viewed by only your group — kindly do not distribute the videos to others or post them to social media. A separate purchase for each viewing is required, and your support of MoMath’s programming is appreciated.
Single-Purchaser Viewing Rights
To learn more about purchasing video recordings of MoMath events for individual views, visit videos.momath.org.
MoMath members receive free access to single-purchaser video recordings. To take advantage, please email videos@momath.org using the email address associated with your MoMath membership.