Yellow Dot Studios is a non-profit production studio founded by Adam McKay — the Academy Award winning writer/director/producer known for Netflix’s second most watched film of all time Don’t Look Up, as well as Vice, The Big Short, Anchorman, Step Brothers, Talladega Nights, and television shows Succession and Winning Time — to fight back against climate disinformation and inaction.
Yellow Dot creates entertaining, memorable, and scientifically accurate videos and other media to challenge decades of disinformation pushed by oil companies and amplified by large swaths of elected leaders and the media. By shining a light on the urgency, responsible parties, and scientifically proven solutions, we aim to empower more people to be part of the conversation about what we’re facing and what we can do about it.
Yellow Dot is funded by philanthropists, commissioned work, and regular people. So yes, we are just another captured tool of the radical Big Survival lobby. We aim to support the creatives, organizations, scientists, and individuals who are similarly allied with the cause of continued human existence on Earth. If that’s you and you want to work together, please get in touch.
Team
Adam McKay is a writer, director, and producer of films including Don’t Look Up, one of the most successful Netflix movies of all time; The Big Short, for which his screen play earned an Academy Award; Vice; Anchorman; Step Brothers; and Talladega Nights. He is Executive Producer of TV shows including Succession, Winning Time, and Game Theory with Bomani Jones. McKay made his name in the comedy world as a founding member of the Upright Citizens Brigade, before becoming Head Writer at Saturday Night Live, and co-founding website and production studio Funny or Die, which, he would like the oil executives to know, was not actually intended as a literal directive.
An alumni of Vassar College as well as Second City and IO Chicago, Staci Roberts-Steele has acted in shows including Parks and Recreation, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, 90210, and in the filmVice, while producing numerous political and comedy videos at Funny or Die. She was co-producer at Hyperobject Industries since 2018, until transitioning to Managing Director of Yellow Dot. At Hyperobject, she produced the spoof Chevron ad, and co-produced Don’t Look Up, also appearing on-screen in the film, and producing the Webby and Ambie nominated companion podcast, Last Movie Ever Made.
Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson is a marine biologist, policy expert, writer, and Brooklyn native. She is co-founder of Urban Ocean Lab, a think tank for the future of coastal cities. She co-edited the bestselling climate anthology All We Can Save, co-founded The All We Can Save Project, and co-created the Spotify/Gimlet climate solutions podcast How to Save a Planet.
Anna Wenger is a 5-time Emmy-nominated producer known for Billy on the Street, Between Two Ferns, and Sarah Silverman: We are Miracles. Former VP of Production for Funny or Die, Wenger most recently finished a stint showrunning 3 seasons of CBS’s educational STEM series, “Mission Unstoppable.”
Elijah Zarlin is a strategist, storyteller, and organizer. His campaigns have been featured in the New York Times, NBC Nightly News, CNN, The Atlantic, Harpers, and more. He wrote emails for Barack Obama on the 2008 Obama campaign, and shortly thereafter got arrested protesting President Obama’s inaction on the Keystone XL pipeline. Twice. His climate work began at Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection and This is Reality, at 387 ppm.
David Fenton, named “one of the 100 most influential P.R. people” by PR Week and “the Robin Hood of public relations” by The National Journal, founded Fenton in 1982 to create communications campaigns for the environment, public health and human rights. For more than five decades he has pioneered the use of PR, social media and advertising techniques for social change. He recently published The Activist’s Media Handbook: Lessons From 50 Years As A Progressive Agitator.
Contact Yellow Dot
Press Inquiries:
Samantha@paulawoodsconsultants.com, Paula@paulawoodsconsultants.com
All others:
yellow@yellowdotstudios.com