B. F. Skinner Plays Himself – Online for 24 Hours and In-Person at 7PM!

Friday, January 23, 2026 @ 7:00pm

NJ Film Festival
71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901

B. F. Skinner Plays Himself revisits the life and works of B. F. Skinner through never-before-seen footage recovered from a failed educational film project. Skinner–a world famous public intellectual in his lifetime who continues to be ranked among the most important psychologists of any era–is now largely forgotten outside a select academic niche. From Skinner’s early work with rats, to pigeon-guided bombs and air-conditioned baby cribs, to Utopian communes and debating Dennis Hopper, we deconstruct the scientist and reimagine his prescient predictions about the pitfalls and potential of shaping behavior. The failure of the abandoned educational film shows that changing behavior–often criticized for its supposed authoritarian potentials–is both more nuanced and more difficult than his critics imagined.

Video on Demand for 24 hours beginning at 12 Midnight Eastern USA. In-Person screening at 7PM in Voorhees Hall #105/Rutgers University, 71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901.