Chicago Police Department - Appearances in Popular Culture

Appearances in Popular Culture

• The 1957–1960 television series M Squad centered on a squad of Chicago Police detectives. The episode "The Jumper" featured an officer taking bribes. It was reportedly this depiction that prompted then-Mayor Richard J. Daley to thereafter discourage motion picture and television location filming in the city for the rest of his administration and its aftermath. John Landis' successful 1980 musical comedy motion picture The Blues Brothers (see more below), marked the reversal of that policy by Mayor Jane Byrne.
• Two notable exceptions to Daley's ban were made in for films released in 1975. In Brannigan, John Wayne portrays Chicago Police Lieutenant Jim Brannigan. Cooley High (set in 1964) was filmed entirely in Chicago and features a car chase through Navy Pier's then-extant warehouse buildings, in which the pursuing Chicago police are repeatedly outmaneuvered by the joyriding teens.
• The Chicago Police Department and Illinois State Police are featured in the climactic car chase in 1980's The Blues Brothers in which a Chicago Police dispatcher matter-of-factly advises responding officers that, "The use of unnecessary violence in the apprehension of the Blues brothers has been approved." Reportedly in response to their portrayal in The Blues Brothers, the Chicago Police Department banned the use of the "Chicago Police" name and insignia in films until the early 2000s, resulting in several films and television shows replacing "Chicago Police" with "Metro Police" and other faux names, even if the films received technical assistance from the department, such as The Fugitive and The Negotiator.
• The television series Hill Street Blues (1981–1987) never explicitly stated the name of the city in which it was set, although many exterior views (lacking the principal actors) were filmed in the city and used for establishing and transition shots. See the main article for expanded discussion on the setting.
• Robert De Niro portrays a former Chicago police officer turned bounty hunter in the 1988 film Midnight Run. Numerous references are made to the CPD as well as corruption within the department. There are also a number of scenes directly involving the CPD.
• The Chicago Police Department played a major role in 1993's The Fugitive, showing them in a semi-brutal fashion after Harrison Ford's character is incorrectly believed to have killed an on-duty police officer. The use of actual Chicago Police Department vehicles and uniforms is extensive and can be see throughout the film.
• In the 1998 film The Negotiator, the Chicago Police played a major role within the film. The real Chicago Police Department provided technical support for the movie's SWAT teams. The actors' shoulder sleeve insignia were similar to the Chicago Police Department's octagonal patches, albeit with "Chicago" replaced with "Metropolitan."
• Chicago police officers are routinely depicted on the television series ER.
• The Chicago police are portrayed in the 2011 Fox Network series The Chicago Code. Unlike most depictions of Chicago police, the actors' uniforms and insignia appear to be identical to their real-world counterparts, despite the series being filmed on-location in the city.
• In The Lincoln Lawyer, Mickey Haller tells Detective Lankford that Frank Levin had been ex-Chicago PD to encourage him to investigate Levin's murder.
• The Terra Nova character Jim Shannon said he was a detective with the department's narcotics squad.