EastEnders and the environment: communicating the planetary crisis in prime-time?

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The BBC flagship continuing drama EastEnders (1985-) is widely accepted as an exemplar of the ‘entertainment-education’ approach, embodying a strong public service ideology and rooted in Reithian values. In this paper I explore the definitional role of the programme in addressing environmental issues in the digital age and argue that this is a novel opportunity to examine the limits and possibilities of the genre to engage with anthropogenic crises. My analysis is informed by the perspectives of EastEnders scriptwriters/consultants and sustainability professionals who perceived prime time drama as providing a unique tool to engage distinctive diverse audiences who are marginalised by blue-chip nature series. For the first time, I address the context in which popular environmental storylines are produced in the UK and identify how storytelling is mediated by the contemporary hostile television environment with intense competition from streaming channels and social media platforms. I outline how the dynamics of environmental storytelling are shaped explicitly by external factors including organisational commitment to climate content and the perceived role of the BBC in catalysing a ‘national conversation’. Powerful tacit assumptions concerning ‘good stories’ being rooted in interpersonal friction potentially risk presenting a false equivalency - given that environmental scientists are reluctant to collaborate with this ‘low status’ media product. Continuing drama facilitates distinct opportunities to connect climate crisis to the lived experience through human-centred narratives but the contemporary television production context is in a state of flux and dated assumptions concerning its role in constructing public attitudes and beliefs need to be revisited.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1-15
Number of pages15
JournalCritical Studies in Television
Early online date9 May 2025
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 9 May 2025

Funding

The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Methods and materials were informed by research completed for the Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging challenge, delivered by UK Research and Innovation, \u2018Providing the 30% recycled content for food packaging (PFP): An integrated stakeholder approach to solving \u201Chard to recycle\u201D plastic packaging\u2019 NE/V010751/1 funded by NERC/Innovate UK and PISCeS: Plastics in Society-A Systems Analysis Approach to Reduce Plastic Waste in Indonesian Societies NE/V006428/1. Seed funding to assist with updating literature searches was provided by University of Strathclyde, RKES, STR1009-203.

Keywords

  • EastEnders
  • climate emergency
  • production
  • sustainability
  • drama

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