TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — Very rarely is the existential threat of climate change considered a laughing matter, unless you are a climate comedian.
It seems an unlikely profession, but Rollie Williams proves that in today’s day and age, you can be anything you want to be. As the creator and host of the digital series called “Climate Town,” he’s been a huge success racking up 550K subscribers and millions of video views.
To some extent, I’d describe his style of comedy to be a cross between The Daily Show and Jon Oliver – doing deep dives into climate-related topics through long-form videos. His videos are funny, informative, and unfortunately, given the lack of climate progress, frustrating.
Full disclosure, Rollie and I went to grad school together at Columbia University. I knew him before Climate Town when he played Al Gore in a monthly climate show in NYC called “An Inconvenient Talk Show.”
Since graduating he’s devoted his time to making his dream of mixing his passions, climate and comedy, to make the climate story digestible to a different kind of audience. He not only does Climate Town but also co-creates and co-hosts a podcast called “The Climate Denier’s Playbook.”
In today’s Climate Classroom, we are talking with Rollie about how he makes the climate crisis funny and how he uses comedy to break the ice (pun intended) on a topic more typically associated with geeky scientists (like myself) and mind-numbing maps and charts.