🎙Interview: June Neely
June Neely (she/her) is a writer/producer from Minnesota now based in Los Angeles. She is the EP/Host of Story for Good. She has worked on projects such as Queer Eye, Love is Blind, and They Cloned Tyrone. She has also written and produced short films and a web series. Her previous podcast work includes the Ambie and Webby-nominated Crossing the Line.
Follow June on Instagram @girlproducer.
Learn more about the Story for Good podcast by visiting the show website or following the show on Instagram @storyforgoodpod.
Before diving into the show you created, let’s talk about some of the work you’ve done on the podcasts Crossing the Line (CTL) and The State of Women (TSOW). Can you share about some of the impact campaign work you did to support these shows that relate to gender equity? What were some of the outcomes of these campaigns?
For each show, we had a different approach since the styles of the shows were different. CTL was a documentary-style podcast. Our main focus was to give a first-hand account of the fight for reproductive rights. Then our main impact goal was to create a robust website and social media that allowed activation for the listeners, this is mostly what I worked on impact-wise. Every episode had a page that highlighted the subjects mentioned (clinics, activists, and non-profits). Then we had a database of resources that listeners could access like non-profits, funds, providers, and ways to take action. We also partnered with other non-profit organizations like Planned Parenthood, Power to Decide, and Plan C Pills.
For TSOW we partnered with Emerge America and How Women Lead to create an informative virtual live event to launch the show.TSOW was more focused on overall gender equality, highlighting the disparities in state laws. We also offered resources on the TSOW website.
Some of the outcomes were we drove a good amount (thousands of clicks) of traffic to our partners like Emerge, Power to Decide, and Abortion Finder. And CTL brought a bigger awareness of reproductive rights with thousands of downloads with almost 25% of those activating to take action.
So what led you to start your own podcast, Story for Good?
This is my second podcast. I had another called June Versus that was created during the pandemic at the height of the BLM protests. It was short-lived because I went back to working full-time on set. But it came out of frustration and wanting to be able to say something about it. Story for Good is similar in that aspect. I had learned the term Social Impact Entertainment and loved the idea and wish I had known about this earlier. There needed to be something that highlighted this part of the industry. So I decided to create it.
When you began working in entertainment, how did you envision yourself working at the intersection of film/tv and social change? Has your vision become reality?
I’m not sure if I did. I started on this journey because I wanted to create stories. Stories about characters who looked like me, who cared about what I cared about, and stories that would express my experiences. But I didn’t have a term for this or know what it meant. I had never heard of Social Impact. I just wanted to see people like me on the screen. It wasn’t until later that I realized the intersection.
Why do you believe entertainment is an important way to incite social change? Can you give an example of how this has been done successfully?
In one of the episodes, I talk to Carri Twigg, who used to work in the White House, on how storytelling can effect policy change. Stories are emotional and invoke feelings that didactic material can’t. Stories create a rallying point, they break things down and make them personal. One big example of this is the show, Will and Grace. It normalized the gay community to the point that when they repealed Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell there wasn’t a big uproar, because prior to this so many military bases had been sent copies of the show.
When it comes to your podcast, you interview different people throughout the ecosystem of social impact entertainment. What are some of the common sentiments they share about the future of entertainment and social impact?
Some of the common sentiments they share are:
Any story can include social impact. It doesn’t have to be as big as the whole premise of the story. It can just be a storyline or a character but every story can do it.
It’s profitable. Some of the biggest films, like Black Panther (positive representation of Black people and Black People in STEM) or Avatar (climate and environmentalism), had a social impact.
Don’t recreate the wheel. Creating a social impact campaign doesn’t mean taking on all the work. So many non-profits and organizations do the work already. If you have a story about fracking or women in business, find a non-profit already working in that space. Ask them the best way to uplift their cause.
No single film or show can create all the change. We need several films and shows talking about the same issues to really make a difference.
What are some of your favorite shows, movies or documentaries that illustrate the power of content for social change?
I mentioned Black Panther earlier but watching it in the theater full of other Black people gave me this feeling of power and possibility I never felt before. Usually, Black films are seeped with trauma but it was nice to feel uplifted for once.
Abbott Elementary is another great one, Quinta Brunson is great at incorporating the trouble teachers face working in the public school system and sprinkling environmental issues while making you laugh.
King Coal is a fantastic documentary that blends in moments of almost fiction in a way I’ve never seen before. Amazing storytelling about what it’s like to grow up in Coal Country and the trials those in the Appalachia face.
Is there any new or upcoming work that you would like to share with us?
This podcast is just the start, I’m currently working on a fiction podcast that I’m looking to release later this year.
If you are interested in learning more about the entertainment industry, you might also want to check out the Sounds Like Impact interview with Avril Speaks of Distribution Advocates podcast.