Greening and Celebrification: The New Dimension of Celebrities through Green Production Advocacy

Abstract

Screen culture and conglomerates are starting to echo the green shooting phenomena; roles such as sustainability director, eco-manager, eco-consultant, and eco-assistant are taking a more prominent space in the entertainment and cultural industry to achieve the goal of creating sustainable productions. In this current context, there seems to be a need for an agent to catch the attention of the audience to make a claim about green policies and contribute to a green literacy fabric. This opinion article recognizes that there are two types of voices, internal (scholars and practitioners) and external (celebrities and audiences), that have arisen in the audiovisual industry from different perspectives. Hence, through a theoretical approach, it tackles the particularities, typologies, and the role celebrities play as hot spots to push both viewers and creators into better decision-making models. The results show two main typologies: celebrification, in which a person becomes famous due to their sustainable actions, provoking a metonymic effect, and recelebrification, when famous people or well-known figures redefine their status by acting sustainable, producing a synecdoche effect. In conclusion, it is difficult to define what goes before and what goes after: whether it is the celebrity who passes the attributes onto production or whether it is the production that, by its characteristics, passes its attributes onto the celebrity.

1. Introduction

The audiovisual and cultural industry plays a crucial role in creating a public discourse consensus on how sustainable development should be [1], particularly concerning ecological and socioeconomic aspects. By doing so, the media, particularly screen culture, “draws on, evokes and articulates readily available cultural and interpretive packages, which in turn set particular frames or boundaries for how these issues are and can be discussed and understood” [2]. In the Capitalocene era, the responsibility for unsustainable actions relies on a system committed to a sharply unequal distribution of wealth and power that has unbalanced the stability of the Earth’s health. Our screen culture (cinema, television, and digital media) has approached emotional responses to the planet’s destruction differently. However, there seems to be a lack of attention placed on culture, and the ecological, societal, and economic impact that the industry itself generates [3]. Many industries and sectors related to fashion, automobiles, food, etc., have already adopted and demanded sustainable and ecological practices, but where has the screen culture positioned itself in terms of both representativity and production? In recent years, our screen culture has been dealing with its ecological, economic, and social impact. Consequently, many media scholars, such as Sean Cubitt, Hunter Vaughan [4], Pat Brereton [5], and Anders Hansen [2], among others, have analyzed, criticized, and brought to public attention the impact that the sector causes in terms of sustainability. These movements are framed under the green shooting concept [3]. Creating sustainable oeuvres has been in the avantgarde of audiovisual studies, also known as audiovisual ecocriticism. So, why has it not been broadly discussed in the same way other industries and sectors have? Why are audiences not demanding a much greener and more equal screen industry? What would be the most helpful and assertive way the public could demand a change to transform the current status of screen culture sustainability?

From set waste, a lack of minority representation, data centers, gender inequalities, and the overuse of electricity to carbon emissions, among others, the misspending that the screen industry generates and provokes is undeniable. Millions of dollars are spent on sets and scenery that are later blown up for the sake of a script. Hence, it has been proven that the screen culture can have a negative ecological and socioeconomic impact in certain aspects, while some might argue that it is a business that needs to produce and make a profit. The concern falls on the beneficial gains and economic growth being at the expense of the South, further emphasizing our current global inequality [6]. Moreover, a screen culture feature is that it is in some cases based on glamour and exhibitionism, going hand in hand with what Hickel has defined as growthism, “the prime directive of capital not for a purpose but for its own sake” ([6], p. 197), which signifies speeding up the mechanism of accumulation, which is detrimental to the well-being of the planet. Screen culture can put sustainable imagery at the forefront of the debate and change the attitudes, perceptions, and behaviors of audiences. Thus, it can become a significant source for the public in an attempt to mitigate the industry’s negative impact. As Hansen ([6], p. 17) stated as a constructionist argument, “environmental problems and social problems generally do not objectively announce themselves but only become recognized as such through the process of public claims-making”. Consequently, the present article aims to analyze the role and dimension that celebrities can have by promoting discourses on green production advocacy and the impact they can generate by drawing attention and centralizing these specific issues into the public and, more significantly, political agenda. This is an opinion article whose methodology is based on a conceptualization of celebrification and the exemplification of some practices related with the processes of celebrification and the promotion of the term through relevant personalities.

2. Green Shooting, Planet Placement, and Creative Freedom

The presence of the screen as a part of our everyday lives has altered and reconfigured the media landscape [7]; its nonlocatable nature may obscure the extended sites in which it operates and circulates [8]. In other words, screen culture is geographically spread out, which makes it difficult to pin down. It is framed and can lead to immaterial imagery that relies mainly on the efficiency of their processes [8] and what it shows more than how it has been produced. Heavy marketing and advertising campaigns over the years have established screen culture as a source of pleasure and social well-being [9], ignoring other discourses such as the impact data storage provokes or the amount of carbon dioxide a production can cause. This effect has been defined by Daniel Goleman as “playing up the sizzle not the steak” [10], which means highlighting two or three qualities of a product or a process to shine up its market appeal.

Nonetheless, as Richard Maxwell and Toby Miller argued [9], media studies, and specifically screen culture, still need to find ways to become greener, even with the current awareness, criticisms, policies, and guides among certain practitioners and scholars of the sector. Emerging media technologies and ICTs are continuously and constantly shown to produce newer environmental impacts. As Maxwell and Miller pointed out, the screen culture “rely on chemical and mechanical production methods with increasingly noxious effects on land, air and the water” [9]. Beyond the environmental impact, screen culture also has the potential to transform culture and minds while forging excellent and lasting social changes. Nonetheless, as shown historically, Hollywood’s reputation as a liberal industry has always been somewhat questionable. From the days of the Hays Code (guidelines for the self-censorship of content that was applied to most US motion pictures between 1934 and 1968) to the current #MeToo scandals about sexual harassment and gender inequality and controversies about the on- and off-screen lack of diversity, such as #OscarsSoWhite, or ethnic stereotypes, such as the yellow face caricature. While there has been an intent to show this problem as being something of our bygone days, many of these went unnoticed for a long time due to the industry’s tendency to cover them up so as not to lose its glamorous essence and due to the fact that actors and actresses were afraid of losing their jobs after being threatened. Currently, there are no more blind spots. The industry needs to revamp its sociocultural image and change some fundamental issues.

In this opinion article, the term of green shooting is understood as a theoretical notion inspired by Birgit Heidsiek’s work and is synonymous with her green film shooting notion, but it differs in the fact that it does not act as a forum for creative professionals in the media to share their experiences but instead is a term to define and cover all practices that are sustainable within the screen culture. The concept has been conceived to describe “a countercultural concept linked to the financial, health, social, professional and educational concerns of the audio-visual field and its sustainable well-being” [3]. The term covers the sustainable well-being of the audiovisual field for informational, educational, and conceptual purposes. The concept also evokes the literal translation of “filming green”, in a sense invoking the concept of “green” as a synonym for “sustainable”, “ecological”, “equitable”, and “social”, among others and appealing to and aligning with the European Union’s Green Deal. Hence, it takes on a broader meaning by including sustainability’s three pillars: ecology, society, and economy. In other words, it deals with the agents and elements that integrate the entire audiovisual industry. Moreover, inspired by Hickel’s work Green Shooting, it takes up the idea that “brings us to the real heart of a post-capitalist economy, ending planned obsolescence, capping resource issues, shortening the working week, reducing inequality and expanding public goods. These are all essential steps to reducing energy demand” [6]. Green shooting believes that in order to achieve degrowth and environmental balance, social and economic factors need to be considered in the screen culture industry. Thus, industry players such as the public institutions that fund audiovisual oeuvres, producers, studios, and channels all need to be taken into account and held accountable.

Moreover, this theoretical concept tries to recompile all the current good sustainable practices and examine issues and criticism that have not yet been resolved. Moreover, it explores the idea that there is still room for actions to improve our screen industries. For instance, Naomi Klein, in her article in The Intercept [11], explained the Screen New Deal, an idea that refers to the position that some politicians and prominent voices in the technology sector (including Schmidt, Andrew Cuomo, and Jeff Bezos) are (mostly) taking in the United States in response to the coronavirus crisis for the purpose of safeguarding public health. They suggest a collaboration between governments and the industry itself to develop a system based on high technology and big data that encompasses almost every aspect of our lives, including education and health. Nonetheless, this once again brings up issues of inequality between the North and the South [6] and raises concerns about technofascism and dehumanization. Undeniably it brings interesting actions to the table to avoid issues that have resurfaced in the COVID-19 crisis, such as cash-free commerce, telehealth, online classrooms, etc., but this will simultaneously require an appropriation of the Earth’s resources, something that is not targeted and available for all of Earth’s population.

Due to its heterogeneous nature, there is no one-size-fits-all solution to addressing its impact in the screen industry. Hence, there is a need for highly specialized, integrated, bottom-up approaches and associated experts to achieve transformative results in a more expanded and systematized manner. However, in the last decade, some remarkable examples have emerged, such as Ecoprod, Fresco Films, Picture Zero, BAFTA Albert, and Earth Angel sets, which should be applauded for their massive contributions to the green production field. On the other hand, the audiovisual industry is a multifaceted arena in which many profiles and several production practices hamper clear policies on green shooting. The heterogeneous variety of products requires different solutions. Newer roles such as the eco-consultant, also known as the eco-manager, emerged in recent years to tackle the problem of understanding the specificities of any production and to ensure that all these practices are incentivized, implemented, and supervised. The tools and services available for the filming crew are applied correctly, per a charter of commitment to a carbon footprint calculator [3]. Many studios are changing and modifying their old practices towards sustainable actions. However, as Vaughan stated [4], most “have limited this to what is popularly known as ‘greenwashing’ (...) replacing disposable waters with water coolers and paper memos with email while continuing with the business of capitalist excess as usual”. Therefore, in a sense, they are making some of their actions more sustainable without changing their business model, as some are only modifying their discourse and effectively deflecting criticism and regulations. For example, The Day After Tomorrow (Emmerich, 2004) was criticized by Hunter Vaughan [12] for presenting a plot in which a natural disaster was prevented by an individual visionary explorer or hero rather than through collective climate action, leaving behind the political responsibility of industries, governments, and institutions. Therefore, if the self fails, it is responsible for carrying this guilt without any possibility of excuse and atonement [13] rather than being perceived as a societal and capitalist-driven problem.

Thus, green shooting can be used as a description for current and future practices; in other words, it aims to marshal the sustainable practices and information of the value chain of all audiovisual activities throughout all their phases of creation, from preproduction, production, postproduction, distribution, and exhibition to consumption. It also includes the concept of planet placement, proposed by BAFTA Albert, which factors a cultural agenda for the planet and its environmental, political, and socioeconomic problems into their programming in our current rapidly evolving entertainment landscape. Thus, it presents a unique and clear opportunity to make an impact through the content we put on our screens by raising awareness through dialogue, billboards, and the messaging of specific topics: deforestation, gender inequality, climate change, etc. A clear example can be observed in Hated in the Nation (3 × 06), an episode from the highly acclaimed TV series Black Mirror (E4 and Netflix, 2011-). The episode explores a somewhat modified present in which bees are being artificially modified to avoid a natural disaster; they also have cameras incorporated into their bodies. Hence, besides raising awareness of our imminent ecological destruction, the episode poses questions about ethics when it finds out that governments are also using the bees as surveillance. Moreover, planet placement tries to help creatives make content that supports the transition to a sustainable future, either in the picture or by promoting the content’s editorial ambitions. The latter, can be introduced by placing brochures, investing in marketing campaigns, and showing off-screen actions or talks with behind-the-scenes footage in which debates can be explored beyond bloopers, such as the one seen in National Theatre Live: Prima Facie (Martin, 2022), a National-Theatre-filmed oeuvre that explored rape in its content but was also presented through a roundtable with actress Jodie Comer and screenwriter Suzie Miller before the screening. The intervention of these policies, as (mostly) witnessed in Europe and US, is supervised by an eco-manager/consultant and may be tangible (corporal and material elements that can be modified, e.g., vegan makeup, eco-vehicles, eco-lighting, etc.) or intangible (the well-being of the crew and social equity in content, e.g., tolerance of multiculturalism, gender equity, concern for the treatment of animals, etc.). Consequently, it can lead to the notion of Carnstone’s brain print [14], which refers to the changes in viewers’ behaviors and attitudes after seeing a program, film, show, series, etc.

This specific implication can raise questions about creative freedom. As Monani and Rust [15] stated, “[eco-film] should not impose a political program—much less predefine aesthetic practices—but to help create public spaces for debate and ethical arguments over the claims of the environment for a place in political life”. Therefore, attention needs to be paid to the audiovisual product as an entertainment or cultural selection rather than a political statement focusing on screen culture through a political lens. This way, an honest debate is established between the creation phase and the script’s writing. Narratives and storytelling demand creative freedom. The story itself might sometimes ask for a realistic or historical context, or perhaps it would just aim to explore the less ethical or darker side of a character that will not go hand-in-hand with the values of planet placement. The plot might often weigh more than the interests of the creators. Moreover, if it seems forced, audiences might accuse creators and studios of imposing values, breaking with the purity of the creative process of narration and tokenism, and consequently becoming victims of the so-called “cancel culture”. However, that does not prevent a need to represent ecological aspects, social justice, gender equity, and other aspects intrinsically connected with green shooting. Creators and eco-managers should try to anticipate these issues, even with the difficulties presented by the script. As we have mentioned, planet placement can arguably represent an excellent chance to promote cultural perceptions and create impactful, long-lasting changes that can improve the well-being of our society (for example, introducing narratives featuring people with disabilities, mental disorders, LGBTQIA+ individuals, etc.). In that sense, the question is not how the values of green shooting can determine stories but rather how, in equal conditions (and without altering the purpose of the storytelling), the narratives can provide measures for the ethical, social, and ecological sustainability of the person outside the screen and not necessarily on the screen. In other words, if the story allows for the representation of eco-socioeconomic values, they could be added, though they should not be forced into it because, above all, the story should be the priority.

Over the last decade, creative freedom has also been compromised by the force of socioeconomic, environmental, and political discourses that seem to possess all the ingredients of political correctness in order to avoid the aforementioned “cancel culture” and appeal to a broader audience that aligns with discourses and interests that advocate for an idea of social and cultural well-being. As Crispin [16] noted, there seems to be a loss of authority by the cultural critic and the creator in the eyes of the movie-going audience. Nonetheless, some narratives try to engage with good analytical writing that challenges audiences to analyze them critically, even if they do not explicitly present planet placement. At the same time, many stories that might still possess that freedom can, with the paratexts around the productions (i.e., merchandising and other marketing strategies, such as interviews with the actors about a movie), help to complement and add nuance to certain discourses to support this balance between ethical struggle and aesthetic proposition.

3. Audience Role

Due to their multimodal nature, screen culture and mass-mediated forms of communication have encouraged audiences to pay attention to issues related to sustainable communication and, in a sense, to make it a matter of social and political concern [17]. Regarding sustainable messaging and visual communication, the language used plays a significant role. Often, the use of metaphor increases the chances of successfully transferring meaning into a particular perspective that manages to frame the unknown and make it comprehensible. Hence, it can potentially change attitudes and stances on aspects [2]. However, screen culture’s detrimental ecological and socioeconomic impact is still not at the forefront of audiences’ thinking, as has been proven by several studies [18]. It is difficult to measure the level of an audience’s awareness about sustainable production. Currently, there is no literature providing evidence in figures, and this can be a barometer. Nevertheless, the lack of demand for a faster change can be understood as an indicator of this absence of consciousness. The reasons behind this unawareness could be due to a range of different factors.

Firstly, most green shooting initiatives are generally regarded by a subculture community of involved scholars and practitioners applying measures in a modus operandi that has not yet been systemized in a general manner. However, it is essential to note that some particular and individual proposals do apply measures, such as Ecoprod, Earth Angel NYC, BAFTA Albert, Fresco Films, and CineEuropa, among others, and there are countries and cities such as Belgium, Vancouver, and Sardinia that have currently systemized their practices. This trend is increasing in other places with significant policy pushes, such as the UK. Nevertheless, in many other countries, this has not yet been established as a criterion for obtaining the necessary funding or is not recognized in any form. Although “many European countries subsidize national programs for audiovisual arts, and [...] in light of this, they could help and encourage productions to set and prioritize sustainable practices” [3], such as in Spain. Secondly, the starstruck factor of screen culture is usually based on the unknown and behind-the-scenes (BTS) secrecy. As Vaughan stated [12], much information about the greener and sustainable practices of the BTS “are not highlighted in information brochures” or in the opening credits and so on. The specific technical knowledge behind some of the phases of production requires certain elements to be concealed from audiences in favor of the script in order to create expectation and surprise, particularly in terms of special effects: animation, make-up, prosthetics, etc. [3]. This problem goes hand in hand with the lack of marketing campaigns and celebrities’ endorsements and critical approaches explaining the impact of screen culture to audiences. If celebrities do not endorse or hop on the green shooting trend, audiences will be unlikely to choose a sustainable screen culture product (film, TV series, videogame, etc.) due to a lack of consciousness. This is the reason why the industry promotes online strategies through social networks to reach the audiences and increase the engagement towards social action [19].

Thirdly, the screen culture industry is mainly based on entertainment. Thus, it seems, more often than not, to be an activity that enables audiences to escape and evade the issues of everyday life. At the same time, edutainment proposals have played a significant role in shifting attitudes and behaviors (brain print) towards a sustainable future in the media industry, especially keeping in mind that this genre has a main goal to provide literacy about social change [20]. By functioning as a megaphone for criticizing malpractices (such as political films), they have mostly been focused on showing the ecological, economic, and societal impacts of other sectors rather than the one that screen culture generates, such as the food industry, e.g., Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (Andersen and Kuhn, 2014), or showing the climate change threat through series such as those of David Attenborough, etc. While we are not saying these proposals should not continue in the future—quite the opposite—the media industry could also make an effort to examine, create, and show its own socioeconomic and environmental impacts.

Fourthly, the audience’s relationship with the contents seen in phenomena such as the notion of alignment, parasocial relationships, and aesthetic distance is more significant than their interest in the production. So much of their attention is not placed on the materiality and production of what they are seeing on screen, which distances them from research about how a screen product is made, thus shifting their social awareness. Fifthly, there is a slight movement to start incorporating green shooting into many mainstream festivals and awards. For instance, at the last Cannes Film Festival, they launched a significant initiative (panels and roundtables), but it still targeted a niche of practitioners, and not much of that part of the festival was covered by the mass media. Specific awards and festivals are solely dedicated to sustainability issues, such as SuncineFest. However, many significant awards consumed by broad audiences are still missing or not giving recognition or importance to sustainable productions, such as the Emmy Awards and the Oscars.

Finally, we should note that a certain opacity of screen culture practices is only known to a literate audience—audiences or scholars trained and aware of how the entertainment industry works. Thus, it contributes significantly to the industry’s untold environmental and social impacts. Even literate audiences are sometimes unable to identify all the elements, but they can try to detect and challenge them.

Lastly, it has to be clarified that public awareness related with the notion of green shooting follows different strategies depending on the agent who creates this literacy. As seen previously, it can be promoted through the content of the production or from the discourses that the crew or the cast can make emerge via various strategies (social media, interviews, reports, rallies, press conferences, etc.). These strategies work simultaneously but operate in different ways, and while the planet placement policies follow a more structured pattern and have the environment at the core of the production, celebrity activism bursts into a more spontaneous approach.

4. Celebrification: From Celebrities to Ambassadors

As we have mentioned, audiences draw most of their scientific and sustainable knowledge from mediated communication, which is their primary information source [2]. Often, audiences see inspiration and the world engrossed in reality on screen. Hence, portrayals of media sustainability from planet placement, sustainable communication, and messaging to sustainable production on and off screen can significantly influence policy discourse at a national and international level [21]. In this context, it has been shown that celebrities play a significant role, particularly actors/actresses, sportspersons, influencers, musicians, and artists. In recent decades, they have become claim-makers and advocates for sustainable issues and discourses ranging from the #MeToo movement to the climate change debate. Hence, this might also help people to change their perspectives and to consider environmental and socioeconomic protection as crucial topics for the future. We analyze celebrities’ roles in green shooting in the following section.

The phenomena of “eco-celebrities”, “green celebrities”, and “celebrity advocacy” are far from new [22]. Nonetheless, in recent years, “among various topics, the climate change issue has received the most attention and efforts from major celebrities” [23]. In fact, in the last two decades, “special attention is paid to the celebrification of climate change as research indicates that it is of growing significance and constitutes a newly emerging area of academic interest” [22]. Celebrity culture possesses a specific cultural power and acts at a symbolic level. Furthermore, celebrities have been shown to provide a human-interest angle to themes that would otherwise be perceived as remote from audiences’ everyday lives. Thus, stars can offer greater visibility, grab the public’s attention, and reach out to people thanks to their high-profile status and persuasive power. By doing so, they can shine a light on specific sustainability issues for an agenda-setting purpose and help shape public opinion.

The typification of celebrities has a long history. In 2004, John Street proposed two celebrity categories under the “celebrity politicians’ umbrella” [24]. On one hand, the traditional politician refers to a legitimately elected representative who engages in popular culture to enhance their pre-established political functions. On the other hand, the entertainer politician refers to a figure who claims political causes since he/she believes that it is his/her right to represent the people but does not seek to be elected to office. Moreover, Boykoff and Goffman [22] expanded these categories into types by proposing six categories in terms of occupation: celebrity businesspeople; celebrity musicians; celebrity politicians; celebrity actors, celebrity athletes, and celebrity public intellectuals. That same year, T’Hart and Tindall (2009) added celebrity activists into the category list, which they defined as a figure in terms of engagement in politics, which can be celebrities that advocate or endorse politicians or politicians turned into celebrities. Finally, McCurdy [25] expanded this notion of “celebrity activists” as entertainment or other prominent media figures who use their acclaimed status to undertake activism and an individual who becomes a celebrity by gaining publicity due to activism. In this chapter, we use McCurdy’s notion, and we propose a denomination for these two-fold actions of interest for celebrities.

Firstly, the first notion presented by McCurdy [25] is what we have named a process of recelebrification, suggesting the involvement of already well-known public figures, influencers, or celebrities with specific brands that represent certain values that are considered “good ones” since these figures hold significant cultural legitimacy [26]. Consequently, their public profile becomes associated with those values, thereby providing a sustainable effect for the companies they work for and that support them. For instance, Shailene Woodley and her cofunded nonprofit organization All It Takes promote safer schools and communities through experiential social–emotional learning, as does her involvement in the rally against the Bakken pipeline. Then there is James Cameron’s documentary Not Reality TV, which targeted and rebutted Trump’s claims on climate change and made headlines after it was spotlighted at the Democratic National Convention, where Sigourney Weaver emphasized the severity of climate change and showcased the short film in which she acted as the narrator.

While in theory these types of actions are relevant, life-changing, and impactful and celebrities can enhance them, making them appear more attractive and credible to the public, any green/sustainable claims that they have made about a brand or organization can be subject to scrutiny [27]. In other words, although many of these activists and celebrities have a particular and genuine interest in these issues, it is also true that it can sometimes be perceived as a means of image laundering for the people or companies they lend their image to. In fact, as Meister highlighted [26], they bring on criticism of nongenuine advocacy or authenticity of purpose since more often than not the focus relies on celebrities rather than the issues they are advocating as matters that require attention [28].

Unsurprisingly, newer terms such as greenwashing, which means to “highlight one or two or more virtuous attributes of a product meant to impart goodness to the whole thing” [10] are now occupying mainstream discourses. These terms provoke serious issues that lead to mistrust and skepticism about the authenticity of specific claims, which impact the faith of consumers or audiences towards those real concerns and discourses [29]. As Meister [26] stated, “the involvement of celebrities in environmental causes also engages the commodity-driven function of capitalism, which often invites public criticisms about engaging the system against which many environmentalists rail”. We can find a celebrification process in which anonymous people can undergo a process of becoming famous for their activism in support of a specific cause. For example, Greta Thunberg became famous for her commitment to climate change after she initiated the movement “Skolstrejk för klimatet” (school strike for the climate) in the same way that Malala Yousafzai became a feminist figure for her fight for female education in Pakistan.

Thus, celebrities can function as a double-edged sword. On one hand, they can act as a valuable means for sustainable groups (public or private institutions, states, and NGOs) to mobilize and promote a particular discourse in the public arena. On the other hand, however, as Weiskel argued, “celebrity politics is a deception that distracts people from dealing with fundamental issues concerning democracy and social change” [30]. Consequently, their involvement in sustainable politics can be perceived as either a democratization process or a distraction, so although sustainable groups can indeed benefit from a spokesperson due to their excellent public relations function, it is essential to note that the message they are providing and its legitimacy may eventually be questioned.

The screen culture industry remains resistant to socioeconomic and ecological changes. For this reason, celebrities and influencers play a crucial role, even if their credibility is sometimes doubted. There has been support from celebrities who, inspired by the role of eco-consultants/managers, have joined the trend to advocate for sustainability in the screen culture sector. Companies such as Earth Angel sets have created a program specifically labeled ambassador. Jason Momoa has indeed partnered with Earth Angel sets to stand against single-use plastics in Hollywood. Communal water stations were the usual ecological standard on-set practices, but unfortunately, with the outbreak of COVID-19, single-use options were brought back as an option to mitigate the spread of the disease. Plastic water bottles were not an option either, and this led to the launch of Momoa’s brand of water: Mananalu’s water offers single-use cans of water packaged in aluminum, an infinitely recyclable material, and thus succeeds in meeting the volume and demands of a production set. As Emellie O’Brien, CEO of Earth Angel, stated: “What Jason is doing in terms of leveraging his status in the industry to invest in sustainable solutions and companies is exactly what we advocate for” [31]. However, it needs to be considered that this is also a business venture. It allows Momoa not only a partnership with future productions but also positive advertising that leads to the leveraging of his persona as both an activist and an actor.

5. From JacksGap to Earthrise Studio: The Success Story of the Harries Twins

One interesting case study that combines both the concept of celebrification and recelebrification is that of Jackson Frayn Harries and Finnegan Charles Frayn Harries, two identical twins best known for their former British YouTube channel JacksGap as Jack and Finn Harries. Initially created by Jack Harries to document his gap year in mid-2011, the channel experienced a rapid increase in popularity after Finn Harries was added as a regular contributor. However, in February 2017, the Twitter and Instagram accounts for JacksGap were deleted, followed by the dissolution of the JacksGap brand. In the beginning, the brand had been focusing on the standard content of 2012–2015, challenges, collaborations, everyday life content, etc., which coincided with the popularity of the British YouTube era, a time in which a group of prominent British YouTubers became “microcelebrities” due to the number of subscribers and collaborations between them. Some of them have maintained their status until the present day. They were (and some still are) the leading figures at events such as Vidcon. The boom received by the British YouTube era allowed JacksGap to use their “celeb status” to shift the focus of attention to topics they were interested in, particularly environmental and social ones. Their collaborations with Skype, Sony, and MyDestination, among others, allowed them to work on sustainable communication and messaging, such as climate change and mental health. Nonetheless, after the release of those projects, due to university and other academic pursuits such as architectural design and filmmaking, in 2018, the JacksGap name was replaced across all social media platforms, favoring Jack Harries. In May 2018, after a two-and-a-half-year hiatus and a considerable loss of subscribers, the channel uploaded a new video called “Jack Harries—The Stories We Tell”, which talked about depression and the relationship between his mental health and social media, thus showing a complete shift in the theme of the channel. In February 2019, Jack Harries was arrested during a protest at International Petroleum Week and publicly spoke about it on the BBC, hence gathering attention in communication media, not only for his previous celebrity status as a Youtuber but for his activism, moving from recelebrification to celebrification. From that point on, all his YouTube content has focused on climate change. He recently released a five-part film series on climate change titled “The Breakdown”. Currently, with Alice Aedy, a documentary photographer and filmmaker, and his brother Finn Harries, a designer, filmmaker, and activist, he has cofunded Earthrise Studio, a creative enterprise devoted to communicating information about climate and social change. The company operates in partnership with Choose Love (a company that sells supplies and services for refugees), Stella McCartney (a brand that is moving towards sustainable fashion), and Ecosia (a German search engine company that donates 80% of their profits to NGOs that focus on reforestation), among others. As Brereton and Gomez stated [28], YouTube will start to take off regarding environmental communication since it “has a huge appeal of celebrity culture online, [or in the case of YouTubers micro-celebrities], since they count with a straightforward storytelling strategy and needs to be deployed in innovative ways as new media formats are co-opted toward addressing climate change”.

Another example of this type of mix of celebrification and recelebrification, but linked to social aspects rather than ecological ones, is actress Emma Watson, who is well known for becoming a UN ambassador and taking on a role as a feminist activist in recent years, especially after her speech at the #HeforShe campaign in 2014. As Lynn Barber stated in 2017 in The Guardian [32], “post-Potter she has received more plaudits for her activism than her acting”, since afterwards Watson selectively chose projects that went hand-in-hand with feminist issues, including Beauty and the Beast (Condon, 2017) and Little Women (Gerwig, 2019). The film Beauty and The Beast was highly problematic due to its old-fashioned female role and the objectification of the female already highlighted in the title. However, Watson pushed the character beyond that of the traditional ideal Disney princess by showcasing Belle as a cultured woman ahead of her time, which helped achieve a narrative featuring a role similar to Hermione from the Harry Potter saga, who presented another type of femininity and is often perceived as a feminist role model, although with many flaws such as a lack of intersectionality and falling under cis-heteropatriarchal characteristics. Thus, Watson guaranteed a consensus in her feminist role and ensured continuity between the actress’s online persona and her two most iconic roles.

Similarly, she played a role in the new adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women (1868) by Greta Gerwig, which is perceived as one of the feminist books of universal literature, mainly since it was written in the late 1860s, although the movie does not shy away from pertinently criticizing the narrative’s lack of intersectionality. Moreover, she has been known for her environmental activism, particularly in fashion, by championing sustainable brands and designers. She joined the board of Kearing (which is in charge of Gucci, Balenciaga, YSL, and Bottega) and has collaborated with People Tree and Pure Threads.

These case studies illustrate how celebrities can use their status but also become “known again” by it in order to change and create long-lasting transformations in the audiovisual industry. Nonetheless, this type of celebrification and recelebrification movement for green shooting is still very much in the minority rather than the majority. Celebrity activism is still more dedicated to the impact of other industries than screen culture, forgetting that it is a movement that could shift, shape, and transform policies since audiences view influencers, celebrities, and public figures differently and in some way distanced from the political establishment. However, due to their status as famous people, they maintain a leverage, a moral authority, and an authenticity when they speak on different causes [33]. Undoubtedly, they hold a specific cultural power, “highlighting both their implication in the capitalist promotional economy and their representational function in public formations, aesthetic orders, and social value systems.” [34]. Nonetheless, while celebrities generally tend to be more successful in drawing media attention to a particular sustainable issue, sometimes they fail to gain coverage in terms of the definition of the problem; simultaneously, within many of the terms being discussed by public figures there are some immensely complex matters lurking that require in-depth knowledge that goes beyond the scope of a campaign.

6. Conclusions

Daniel Goleman assertively stated in his book titled Ecological Intelligence: The coming age of radical transparency [10], “green is a process, not a status” [31]. Indeed, he proposed the concept of “greening” from a semantic perspective to shift the focus from an adjective to a verb to understand that “nothing made industrially can be utterly green, only relatively more so” [10], but we can strike to make it in the best or more sustainable manner and opt for a product’s life cycle assessment. Screen culture needs to improve its “sustainable-ing”, while we do not deny and applaud many of the proposals and works already implied by many productions and institutions. Our main concerns are related to how the screen culture industry can tackle its issues in the same fascinatingly skillful ways in which specific sectors and claim-makers (large corporations, governments, and public institutions), thanks to their ample access to resources, are influencing audiences to call for and demand a sustainable industry. The audiovisual sector needs to take advantage of its perks, such as the affordance of the digital media landscape and the processes of celebrification and recelebrification to optimize their environment messaging and influence.

Throughout this article, we have aimed to illustrate how the process of disseminating green shooting culture occurs through various movements that are not necessarily coordinated but are a direct result of a tacit and implicit dialogue and a prevailing current of thought. Internal (scholars and practitioners) and external voices (celebrities and audiences) have arisen in the industry from different perspectives. In an organized manner, the audiovisual sector has tried to include some green shooting practices, in line with the generalist policies developed in the field. At the same time, protest movements have emerged, especially in large industrial schemes, which more global demands in other areas have reinforced. Thus, currently there are two movements. On one hand, a global movement corresponds to four agents: (1) mass media communication, (2) the industry of audiovisual production; (3) policymakers; and (4) audiences that demand change concerning green production. On the other hand, a local movement, deeply explored in this article, is based on celebrities. Two types were identified.

Firstly, an anonymous one, in which a person becomes famous due to their actions, which we named a celebrification process. Hence, the effect is metonymic. What does metonymic mean in this case? It takes on the literal meaning of metonymy as a rhetorical element: the substitution of the name of an attribute or adjunct for that of the thing that is meant. In other words, they do not speak directly of what they are but rather what the characteristics explain they are surrounded by, to explain how these anonymous people promote and speak of the effects of green shooting from green production to minority casting, and this in a collateral manner makes them celebrities. We refer to a metonymic effect because there is a cause–effect relationship between what they do and what they become.

The second type that was identified is when famous people or well-known figures redefine their status through a recelebrification process. They are famous for their work (music, theatre, politics, cinema, photography, etc.) but obtain another famous status for their work on a very specific and particular cause, which ends up changing their entire image perception—usually positively—and they are known for that as well, sometimes even including it into their work. For example, Emma Watson was known for her role as Hermione in the Harry Potter saga, but due to her involvement in feminist politics, they have now become her signature both on and off screen. This produces a synecdoche effect, which again takes on the literal meaning of a figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole or vice versa. In this sense, it is difficult to define what goes before and after: whether it is the celebrity who passes the attributes onto production or the production that, by its characteristics, passes its attributes onto the celebrity. Both movements are probably valid in both directions.

Finally, the following diagram summarizes how movements are developed to create a climate of opinion and a particular zeitgeist in the field of green shooting. In the center, the notion of green shooting involves two movements, one referring to global actions and the other referring to individual ones. The global action, structured by collective synergies or the presence of global agents, is chiefly promoted by the mass media (the press, the social networks, the radio, the television, etc.), the film industry itself, the policy makers (politicians, cultural institutions, funding entities, etc.), and the fans organized around the products. On the other hand, the individual action has two derivatives: one related to anonymous people becoming celebrities (and then participating in the metonymy effect, which was already explained) and the other one related to people who are already celebrities who pass through a recelebrification process with the consequent synecdoche effect. In that sense, from the global trends we described earlier to the most individual and unique ones that pass through two complementary but ostensibly distinguishable effects, audiences have prominent roles in both the global movements and the individual ones. The fandom universe contributes to creating a singular discourse and introduces the green shooting notion in the agenda. At the same time, individuals take the position of an anonymous audience in this metonymic effect to speak out for them, and the process of celebrification actually becomes an endorsement to support the cause. In the future, we will need to see how audiences acquire a more active role and how, in an industry that generates many products in a rather amateurish manner but with broadcast quality, green shooting policies are implemented effectively. Whether these sustainable productions will become leaders in the current green shooting culture remains to be seen. Time will tell if their formats allow it, owing to a lack of pressure from the professional industry and perhaps a generational issue, or if, on the contrary, the lack of resources, structure, and advice forces them to resort to the old practices of an audiovisual sector that failed to take green principles into account. (Figure 1).