Can we make greening the film industry sexy?

Los Angeles is the heart of the western film industry. Films of varying quality have been created as a love letter to the City of Angels, nestled amongst the hills on the western coast of the United States. This year, in early January, wildfires that started in those very hills ripped through the city, killing at least 28 people, displacing thousands of residents and causing hundreds of billions in property damage.

The unseasonal infernos saw hundreds of thousands faced with evacuation orders and forced the shut-down of a number of productions including Grey’s Anatomy, Jimmy Kimmel Live and, ironically, Amazon’s post-apocalyptic drama Fallout. The impact of the fires was widely acknowledged across the creative industries as awards shows, nomination and tour announcements were all postponed. Those who fought the fires were honoured at the Grammys and Oscars, and a two venue benefit concert raised over $100 million according to organisers.

The World Weather Attribution’s Los Angeles wildfires study found that climate change made the costliest wildfires in California’s history more likely, and much more intense because of fossil fuel-driven climate change. Rightly, much focus is being placed on the architects of climate change. Greenpeace UK’s senior climate campaigner Philip Evans told Little White Lies, “The big question now is who pays for the estimated $250 billion worth of damages? The answer should be simple – the oil and gas industry. These climate criminals have spent decades pumping greenhouse gases into our atmosphere, driving the climate crisis and creating the conditions that caused these fires to happen. It’s time big polluters stopped drilling and started paying for the devastation they’re causing.”

Whilst watching Beyoncé accept her Album of the Year award from LA firefighters (who she went on to thank) was nice, it’s hard to not notice that the fossil fuel companies that are alleged to have heavily contributed to the conditions were absent from the discourse. So too, tellingly, was the impact of the creative industries on the climate.

Film and television is big business – in 2018 the global box office was worth $136 billion. The global entertainment industry also generates millions of metric tonnes of CO2 per year. Large big budget productions – the type that dominate the box office and award seasons alike – can emit up to 3,370 metric tons of CO2 equivalent. That’s the same as powering 702 homes for one year. Of course this number greatly increases with the use of generative AI in a film’s production. Creating one image using the technology can use as much power as charging your phone.

As far back as 2011, the subject of the environmental impact of the screen industry has been recognised by those within it. One such organisation is BAFTA’s albert, who, according to their website, is a BAFTA owned, industry-backed group founded in 2011 to support the film and TV industry to reduce the environmental impacts of production and to create content that supports a vision for a sustainable future. The organisation offers and runs online tools, training events and projects with “the aim of helping screen industry professionals identify and act upon opportunities on and off screen that will lead to effective climate action.”

It’s from one of these projects that the Green Rider was born. “The idea was artists using their contracts to negotiate for more sustainable practices on set.” Actor, writer and campaign member Danusia Samal says. “Unfortunately when Covid came along, a lot of this work got sidelined. In 2023, I was working with a brilliant network of climate conscious actors called “Equity for a Green New Deal” and wanted to do more work around screen and sustainability. So we picked up the idea of the green rider, and with BAFTA albert’s blessing, began to build a campaign that was actor-led, ambitious, and collaborative.”

The campaign tasks screen industry professionals with negotiating specific green clauses – such as sustainable food on set and low emission transport options – into their contracts to encourage productions to lessen their impact on the climate.

“Our launch at the Edinburgh TV festival was a great success. Around 200 actors signed our open letter (including Paapa Essiedu, Bill Nighy and Gemma Arterton). And we received lots of great press,” Samal says. “Since then, we’ve trialled the Green Rider on five TV shows and three films. All the productions made significant wins around emission reduction, and bigger cultural changes around how ‘green’ measures are viewed on set.”

Endorsements from actors including Benedict Cumberbatch, collaborations in the US and beyond, and the receipt of funding to expand their work has seen the campaign transform into a long term, sustainable endeavour to green the industry. Here in the UK campaigners have worked alongside performers union Equity to negotiate a Green Rider into their collective agreements with PACT (the UK screen sector trade body for independent production and distribution companies).

The transformative work of the Green Rider attracted the attention of climate activist and advocate Issey Gladston who runs the podcast ‘How to Make Climate Change Sexy’. “The tagline for this project is “serving c*nt in a time of ecological crisis,” Gladston says over email. “I wanted to create a space that infused climate conversations with a bit of humour – something that cuts through the often overly earnest, doom-laden tone of environmental discourse. A lot of climate coverage feels like it’s coming from the same angle, speaking to the same audience. But what about those who don’t identify with the “crunchy granola” image of a climate advocate?”

The project, which includes a podcast and a popular meme Instagram page, saw its first public outing earlier this year in the shape of a live podcast recording and screening of Spirit of Place which implemented the Green Rider during its production. The short film, starring Mark Rylance and directed by Jack Cooper Stimpson, is a beautiful mediation on connection and nature, shot entirely in Woodberry Wetlands in north London.

“The screening came about because Jack reached out to me as he’d seen the meme page and liked the vibe of the project and this was before season two of the podcast came out! I liked the work he was putting out in the film world as it also felt a bit more unexpected and less like climate apocalypse porn so we decided to co-host this event.”

Before setting up the screening, Gladston had not considered the environmental impact of filmmaking: “I imagine that’s true for many film lovers. We’re often encouraged to think about sustainability in terms of food, travel, or fashion, but we rarely stop to consider the footprint of the films we watch.”

Greening cinema is no easy task. As with any monolithic industry there is resistance to change – particularly if that change is being read as coming with increased cost or as impacting creative choices. A campaign like the Green Rider, which focuses on utilising the bargaining power of, particularly, actors, in a traditionally precarious industry. That being said, as Issey, Danusia and the other guests on the live podcast rightly pointed out, the industry is no stranger to sweeping, radical change in short spaces of time. Just ten years ago, the inclusion of intimacy coordinators as a growing standard on set seemed unthinkable.

Whilst the focus of the Green Rider campaign is on encouraging big studios and governments to enact change and invest in the sort of infrastructure that will make greening cinema easier, the role of cinema lovers in supporting it cannot be understated. “I think showing enthusiasm and support for projects that have been filmed in a greener way, or actors that make greener choices will help show the industry that audiences care about this issue.” Samal says.

For Gladston, who has set herself the unenviable task of trying to sex up climate change, audiences are integral to the mission of greening an industry increasingly being affected by climate breakdown. “By supporting actors who adopt the Green Rider, we can send a clear message to agents and studios that sustainability is not just ethically important, but also a reputational win for those involved, encouraging more people to sign up,” she argues. “If enough actors get on board, it creates a ripple effect—pushing studios and production companies to make meaningful changes in response to industry and public demand.”

There are many that worry that the January wildfires – unprecedented as they were in both scale and season – were simply a warm up act for what’s to come. It’s clear the work of greening all parts of our society, including the entertainment industry, is vital to our survival. The work of the Green Rider campaign, along with podcasts like ‘How to Make Climate Change Sexy’ is an integral part of the solution.