Increasing the representation of climate in Hollywood

When was the last time you saw climate change being represented on a show or movie? Was it Don’t Look Up (2021)? The Day After Tomorrow (2004)? Something else? More importantly, how often do you see climate change represented on screen? Do the fictional characters you love share your concern for the climate crisis, or does it feel like they exist in a world where it isn’t happening?

Good Energy is a nonprofit creative consultancy that’s unlocking the power of TV and film to inspire courage in the face of climate change. They tackled these questions head on, and found that even though 75 percent of Americans are alarmed, concerned, or cautious about climate change (according to the Yale Program for Climate Change Communications), climate change is barely acknowledged in the stories we see on screen.

If climate isn’t in your story, it’s science fiction.

Dorothy Fortenberry — Writer & Producer, The Handmaid's Tale, Extrapolations

Good Energy partnered with me to build a brand and website that would communicate the urgency of the climate crisis while enticing stakeholders across Hollywood to collaborate with them. After all, Hollywood helps shape our culture and creates the cultural conditions for change, so increased portrayals of climate change will lead to positive climate impact.

Through multiple phases of work over the course of two years, founder and CEO Anna Jane Joyner and the Good Energy team worked with EJ to develop a captivating brand identity and a website that encapsulates Good Energy’s essence. From 2022 to 2025, I served as Good Energy's creative director, overseeing creative production of the Playbook for Screenwriting in the Age of Climate Change, entertainment consulting services to support writers and showrunners, workshops to train Hollywood creatives, and a groundbreaking research report in collaboration with USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center Media Impact Project, among other projects.

According to Anna Jane, this work has “enabled Good Energy to make it as easy and inspiring as possible to portray climate change on screen. We’ve been able to differentiate ourselves from others in the industry and show storytellers that this work can be exciting... the brand is so beautiful that we stand out from the crowd.”