The Climate Screenwriter: All Hands on Deck! 10 Reasons Why the Time is Now for Screenwriters to Help Save the Planet

When I was a young woman, screenwriting arrived unannounced and whisked me off my feet. One moment I had the urge to jot down details of a vivid daydream, the next I was twirling around my apartment clutching Richard Walter’s The Whole Picture: Strategies for Screenwriting Success in the New Hollywood like it was the last butter-dipped steamer at a New England clambake. Screenwriting and I flirted, dated, fought, and made up, again and again. Once, we even got this close to becoming engaged. Ultimately, screenwriting took more than it gave, and I called our relationship off once and for all.

Or so I thought.

A couple years back, while out walking my dog, I absentmindedly hit ‘play’ on an episode of a favorite climate change podcast. Host Doug Parsons was interviewing Cheryl Slean, cofounder of the NRDC’s Rewrite the Future, an initiative through which consultants engage Hollywood filmmakers and showrunners on climate storytelling. The more I listened, the faster my heart pounded until… KABLAM! My lifelong interest in environmental stewardship crashed headlong into my old flame, screenwriting. Realizing that something as ominous and unwieldy as the climate crisis could be addressed and even mitigated through entertainment blew my mind. Just like that, a romance was rekindled.

1) The Ticking Clock. Every screenwriter knows this plot device. It ramps up the tension and alerts the audience that time is of the essence. Turns out there’s a literal Climate Clock showing that we have 6 years left to stave off the worst climate effects. The urgency of this situation is backed by hundreds of global climate scientists who’ve said if we don’t act now, we won’t be able to act at all. We’re approaching the “All hope is lost” moment. But…

2) Hope is Not Yet Lost. Screenwriters are adept at getting characters into a pickle then finding ways to get them out of it. What better skill to bring to bear on the big, ever-warming pickle jar we now find ourselves in? Imagine the real-world impact of your climate stories when audiences see characters overcoming difficult, climate-driven scenarios that they too grapple with.

3) Narrators Need Apply. Climate scientists aren’t trained to effectively deliver information to the public. Stats, data, and jargon just aren’t that digestible. We need you to be the reliable narrator who takes a climate issue, breaks it down into bite-sized pieces, and delivers it to the audience in an engaging, entertaining, and relatable way.

4) Possibilities Abound. You might think climate screenwriting is relegated to dystopian futures and disaster narratives, or that it’s just for sci-fi writers. But nope. Though those genres have dominated our collective climate consciousness for years, just about any story can be a climate story – and, boy, are we ripe for new takes. So bust out your rom-coms, teen dramas, thrillers, and heist movies. This is your chance to be that much more creative and innovative in your storytelling.

5) Final Destination. Screenwriters are the visionaries of our culture. Most people need to see before they believe, but screenwriters have the power to help us believe things so we may then see them. You can be on the frontlines of envisioning new futures. What does the world look like after climate change? Which behaviors or innovations might replace overconsumption? How can characters connect more deeply to the land they live on? Help us see What Could Be and we’ll more easily follow suit.

6) We Got Issues. The climate crisis is not “an” issue, but a condition that affects all issues. Your script need not feature tree huggers, litterbugs, or vermicomposters to be a climate story. If your character grapples with a health condition, for example, that condition is being affected, one way or another, by the climate crisis. No need to change your genre or focus. Whatever story world you’re creating, it’s already being impacted by climate.

7) Reach, Reach, Reach. It’s embarrassing to state something so plainly obvious, but I’ll say it anyway. TV shows and films have immense global reach. According to tvScientific, 5.4 billion people have a TV in their home. (Insert exploding mind emoji here.) Screenwriters reach people in every corner of the world. Awakening mass consciousness through storytelling is a pretty badass superpower, yeah?

8) Diversity Required. I believe the climate crisis started way back when colonists murdered and displaced indigenous people, the original stewards of the earth. At present, indigenous people make up only 5% of the earth’s population but protect 80% of its biodiversity. Environmental racism allows climate offenders to thrive. Climate screenwriting offers the inverse. It resists dominant narratives and re-envisions whose stories get told. If you’re a writer from a historically excluded community, climate screenwriting is here for you. Your voice is powerful and necessary. (And, if you happen to be a producer or exec, here’s another reason to go to bat for diverse voices!)

9) Defeat the Antagonists. As climate journalist Emily Atkin said recently at the Hollywood Climate Summit, climate change isn’t happening to us, it’s being done to us. Fossil fuel execs knew the risks of global warming in the 1970s. Instead of averting literal disasters, they engaged in multi-billion dollar misinformation campaigns to deceive us about the reality of a world dependent on oil and gas. Darth Vader has nothing on these guys! Putting out scripts with innovative climate content is an act of defiance against these <bleeps> who consistently put profit over a livable future.

10) It’s Hot! This is a moment, people, and you can be part of it. Good Energy, Nia Tero, The Black List, Hollywood Climate Summit, Rare, The Redford Center, and more are all helping screenwriters tell climate stories. Just this year articles mentioning climate screenwriting have appeared in major pubs like Mother Jones, Time, Forbes, The NY Times and The Atlantic. Change happens slowly – until it doesn’t. Populating the cultural landscape with visions of anti-dystopian futures can help bring about a tipping point that’s actually positive.

Screenwriters are poised to help us take the path least traveled by Thelma and Louise. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres even name dropped the 2023 Academy Award-winning Best Picture in a recent address saying, “Our world needs climate action on all fronts – everything, everywhere, all at once.” Let that nod be a call to action. You don’t just have to write about superheroes, you can be one too.

What recent movie or television show have you seen that includes mention of climate change? Did it work for you? Let us know by tagging us on all platforms, and don't forget to use the hashtag #ClimateScreenwriting.