Green Comedy: Challenges and Models of Promoting Environmental Change using Television Comedy and Satire

The objective of this research is to study and characterize the challenges that TV professionals faced when creating comedies and satires about the environment, and what are the approaches and strategies they applied in order to confront these challenges. This, in order to become familiar with and explore ways to effectively incorporate environmental issues in comedy and satire in view of strengthening and enhancing the environmental goal. The theoretical structure of the research is based on Entertainment-Education, or Edutainment, or the standard abbreviation –EE. (Rogers & Singhal, 1999).

     The theoretical body of work and the existing studies on intentional integration of social content in entertainment platforms focuses primarily on the effect on the audience. That is to say, the manner in which the project contents impact potential target audiences. These studies emphasize the end of the process, therefore it is worthwhile expanding and delving into the current theoretical and practical knowledge pertaining to earlier stages, by way of interviews with the TV professionals themselves, among others.

     The relevant literature shows that in order to create programs that effectively promote environmental issues, one must create a mutual endeavor among people who promote environmental issues, who are not used to collaborating. Developing Edutainment and creating intervention programs that apply the strengths of both parties must include the creation of a joint language and a joint work arena (Bouman 2002).

     To this end, we must procure a better understanding of the challenges facing each party seeking to create programs about the environment and of the means to tackle these challenges. This, in order to create fertile ground for collaboration. This study focuses on comedy and satire since they generate a critical environmental discourse that does not come to light for the most part in other genres.

     Satirical comedy, both in the format of a comedy drama or a sitcom, can partake in creating social change. The “Comedy structure” theory aims to explain this capacity. In comedy, which employs critical elements, viewers are provided an opportunity to see themselves in a new light. This enables them to see the wrongs in their world which have often already become embedded and a hidden norm; to observe themselves and the way they behave, as Burke writes (1937) – “To be observers of themselves”. This point of origin enables critical confrontation which sets out to generate social change.

This study is divided into two main parts and examines four primary research questions:

     The first part examines what type of entertainment programs focus on environmental issues and discerns the different forms of criticism in each genre.       Also, it examines which genres and programs promote behavioral changes and convey messages pertaining to environmental behavior. The first research question:

1. Which genres in the entertainment media promote environmental issues in the USA, England and Canada and in which did the program creators wish to promote behavioral change in the environmental context.

The second and main part of the study focuses on the challenges and strategies that TV professionals apply to create comedy and satire that pertain to the environment. This part focuses on three central research questions:

1. What is the personal motivation of comedy and satire creators in Israel and the USA and what are the challenges they face when seeking to incorporate the environmental issue in their work?
2. What have TV professionals chosen to do in order to overcome the challenge of incorporating environmental matters in their programs? What was their modus operandi?
3. How do the TV professionals perceive the potential of their impact as comedians and of the programs they create on target audiences?

Findings – Mapping environment oriented entertainment programs in the USA, England and Canada

     Of the entertainment genres, comedy and satire have a common and dominant critical point of origin. In addition, scripts can be effectively incorporated into comedy and satire that promote a change in environmental behavior, even in primetime.

Findings – Interviews with comedy and satire professionals in Israel and the USA

     Most TV professionals consider it their role to influence public opinion and attempt to correct social wrongs. In terms of environmental issues, many of the TV professionals do not consider this issue important nor worthy of undertaking.  They claim they are unfamiliar with the environmental issue, an issue that their children understand and will know how to tackle in the future. In this regard, there are cultural differences between American and Israeli TV professionals. American professionals acknowledge that environmental issues will impact their children’s future. The “environment is not important” approach or “the children will deal with it” is more widespread among the Israeli TV professionals. Though the Israeli TV professionals were not raised to care for the environment, budding changes in perception and an understanding of the urgency of the problem can be seen in some. A central issue that came up in the interviews is the way in which they perceive the chances that environmental comedy will amass an audience. Here, the environmental issue suffers from inferiority due to three factors that comprise challenges/downfalls as the TV professionals’ perceive them:

1. They claim the public is not sufficiently aware of the issue – Generally the environment is not a component of current affairs.
2. In their view, the public still perceives the environmental undertakings as unserious and unrealistic.
3. They believe that a majority of the public do not deem environmental issues central to daily life; they consider them remote and intangible.

     In addition to these concerns regarding the public’s perception of the issue, the TV professionals must confront the system in which they work. Many TV professionals feel that commercial television limits them. They report that in the existing media climate, in which major broadcast channels are owned by corporations, they must apply self-censorship.

     This study also examines the approaches and strategies of those TV professionals who did confront environmental issues in comedy, whether as a result of a broadcast network’s initiative such as NBC’s “Green Week”, or as an independent enterprise, or both.

Common Strategies employed by the TV professionals:

     The TV professionals were divided into two main groups: The first group, TV professionals who work and create according to the classic satire approach. The second, professionals, who adopt the dialogue approach. Some of the TV professionals who adopt the dialogue approach, want to provide viewers with knowledge and tools to confront “the environmental crisis”, i.e., they apply a proactive approach to promote behavior that is in line with the Edutainment approach.

     However, despite the differences between the TV professionals, they all apply three mutual strategies when creating environmental comedy or satire.

1. Please do not preach – The professionals believed the comedy should not be  preachy, or it no longer will be a comedy.
2. The environmental narrative must emerge from the program – In order to avoid preaching, the TV professionals tried to be “elusive with the message”. The environmental statement must be assimilated in the story in a natural fashion that complies with the characterization of the characters and their behavior.
3. Emotional connection and creating empathy with the characters – All the TV professionals claimed it is important the viewers care about the characters – creating an emotional bond to the environmental story via human conflict. Meaning, create empathy with the characters, a story the viewers can relate to.

Conclusion:

      This study presents how comedy and satire could be used to help promote environmental issues in two ways: 1) In a critical way, using satirical parody to bring about criticism towards environmental wrongs. 2) Providing tools for behavioral change in terms of the environment, while incorporating environmental issues in a comedic story and drama and thus evoking empathy with the protagonists. Its findings indicate that both parties –environmental experts and comedy and satire creators, face great challenges on the way to creating successful and effective Edutainment programs that focus on the environment. I hope this paper will provide an understanding of the challenges that comedy and satire creators face as they seek to deal with environmental issues on TV, and teach us about the strategies that TV professionals in Israel and the USA chose in order to tackle this issue.