left to right: Then-U.S. Rep. Dana Roherbacher (R-CA), “Little Pink House” writer-director Courtney Moorehead Balaker, executive producer Kerry Welsh, the real Susette Kelo, producer Ted Balaker, and U.S. Rep Jamie Raskin (D-MD) at the 2018 Capitol Hill screening of “Little Pink House.”
This year is a perilous time to release the film I just directed, but here I am.
I’m a filmmaker with heterodox views, and I’ve long worked with and befriended people who disagree with me about every hot-button issue you can imagine. I’ve grown frustrated with them at times, and I’m sure plenty of them have grown frustrated with me.
But I’ve benefited from hearing their points of view, and I hope they’d say the same about hearing mine. Creative pursuits also benefit from that friction because no side holds a monopoly on truth.
The entertainment industry is a powerful shaper of thought, but it has long suffered from narrow-mindedness. For many years, that narrow-mindedness has been frustrating. Since 2020, it’s become almost suffocating. (I offer some details in a piece I wrote for Persuasion, and plan to offer plenty more at Shiny Herd.)
Many otherwise creative people quietly conform to whatever the larger group decides is the correct way of thinking. Groupthink produces dogmas that are adopted with little discussion or debate.
A monoculture is a tedious culture.
It produces movies, television, jokes, and other forms of art that till the same ground over and over again, while ignoring more fertile territory. Dissenters bring their own shortcomings, but a wise culture would welcome them. Too often our culture suppresses them.
I directed the forthcoming feature documentary “The Coddling of the American Mind,” which is based on The New York Times bestselling book by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt.
In the film, Haidt addresses dissent during a section on social media:
When we suppress dissent, when we intimidate dissenters, we make ourselves stupid. Because other people challenging us make us smart. It's almost like they're an extension of our brain. So social media and cancel culture is like a way of shooting yourself in the brain.
The entertainment industry keeps shooting itself in the brain. That makes all of us dumber and less able to address society’s most pressing problems.
Even the debate around cancel culture (a term I don’t particularly like) often feels like a shot to the brain. When the latest controversy erupts, members of Tribe Blue and Tribe Red typically respond according to tribal expectations.
Too often the debate covers the same ground over and over, and ignores cancel culture’s hidden and more pernicious side.
Shiny Herd will explore the hidden side of groupthink in entertainment and media (I started my career in network news and remain intertwined with the media industry).
Shiny Herd will also provide updates on “Coddling The Movie,” and will sometimes cover topics outside of entertainment and media. (Subscribers will get Shiny Herd delivered straight to their inboxes each Tuesday and Thursday.)
After producing content for the likes of ABC News, Dimension Films, Drew Carey, PBS, Reason, and Universal Pictures, my wife and I started our own production company in 2011. We produce feature films and other content under the banner of our company and for others. We also consult on film and television projects.
Our motto is “making important ideas entertaining.”
We don’t want to make films for this tribe or that tribe, and we’ve enjoyed some success in entertaining viewers from different points of view.
Our 2018 film “Little Pink House” stars two-time Academy Award nominee Catherine Keener and Emmy nominee Jeanne Tripplehorn. It dramatizes the true story of a working-class woman named Susette Kelo who fights back against powerful politicians who are bent on bulldozing her neighborhood for the benefit of Pfizer Corporation.
The film was the subject of a bipartisan congressional screening co-hosted by one of the most progressive members of Congress, U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and one of the most conservative, U.S. Rep. Dana Roherbacher (R-CA). It opened the progressive Athena Film Festival where the honored guest was Gloria Steinem and the libertarian Anthem Film Festival where the honored guest was Steve Forbes.
Our 2016 documentary “Can We Take a Joke?” features comedians like Gilbert Gottfried and Penn Jillette. It was the first mainstream film to explore cancel culture, and it earned praise from jokesters ranging from blue-collar comedian Larry the Cable Guy to progressive provocateur Seth MacFarlane.
Our films have received positive reviews from outlets as varied as The San Francisco Chronicle and National Review. They’ve screened on hundreds of college campuses, sometimes sparking outrage, but more often sparking conversation.
But since 2020, a great chill has swept through the entertainment industry. That makes it tricky to release a film that challenges many beliefs held as sacred in academia, entertainment, and corporate America.
We’ve worked hard to withstand the chill.
We have again assembled a diverse array of partners, and we’ll be in fine shape if the same media outlets that praised the book also pay attention to the film.
But first we must secure distribution, and that’s the most treacherous part of our journey.
Distributors, festival programmers, sales agents, and other film industry gatekeepers have grown more reluctant to offend the wrong people. We keep up with the chill in the news, but most of it goes unreported. We hear plenty about it from friends and associates, and we’ve experienced the chill directly.
In other words, I don’t know how the film version of “The Coddling of the American Mind” will be received. The uncertainty may not be good for my stomach, but it makes for a more entertaining trip for Shiny Herd readers!
I hope you’ll come along for the ride.
Ted Balaker is a filmmaker whose recent work includes “Little Pink House starring Catherine Keener and Jeanne Tripplehorn,” “Can We Take a Joke?” featuring Gilbert Gottfried and Penn Jillette, and a forthcoming feature documentary based on the bestselling book, The Coddling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt.