Sundance Snowman 2020
Minnesota Snowman Brings Climate Change Movie Pitch To Sundance
By Emily Means, FEB 5, 2020
KPCW National Public Radio, Park City, Utah
Among the crowds of visitors, celebrities and volunteers, Sundance attendees may have noticed a curious character present during the festival. A snowman came to the festival with a message about climate change.
Wearing a foam snowman suit, complete with a black top hat and a fuzzy, red scarf, Steve Firkins spent every day of the Sundance Film Festival out on the street in downtown Park City. With a briefcase in hand and a sign that said “stop global warming” on one side and “save yourselves” on the other, Firkins hailed from Minnesota to pitch a movie.
“I’m here, I drove here, and actually I’ve been sleeping in my van the last eight, nine days," Firkins said. "I’m serious. I’m serious about pitching my movie.”
Firkins is an artist who works in “curvism,” a concept he created to celebrate the roundness and fluidity of nature. It led him to writing a movie script called “The Filmmakers.” The movie starts as science fiction then turns into a documentary about the consequences of climate change and possible solutions. Firkins described the basic premise. “Can two aliens inspire three TV news reporters to motivate seven-and-a-half billion people to save themselves from climate change?” Firkins explained.
In addition to artist and writer, Firkins also considers himself an activist. He says hundreds of people stopped to take pictures with him during the festival, and he feels like he’s convinced them to care about climate change. “It’s an attention-getter, but I’m trying to raise that attention. We are in a deep, deep hole with climate change. We need to act fast.”