Carey Lundin is a multi award-winning director, writer and producer specializing in comedic digital series, media for progressive candidates, and documentaries.
Lundin recently directed and co-wrote The WORST Travel Show, a five-episode comedy / travel series for the newly launched Facebook Watch and WatchMojo.
Her digital series, Citizen Kate, The Outsiders’ View of Inside Politics, (90 episodes, distributed by FiOS, and YouTube Partner as an official partner channel) followed Barack Obama from his launch through his inauguration. The series had hundreds of thousands of followers and hit a high water mark when her butter bust of Obama made the international news and helped him secure the vote in the crucial Iowa caucus.
In 2016 Lundin rebooted Citizen Kate to cover Trump’s early campaign in Iowa, Clinton and Bernie Sanders. That series featured two Second City improvisers and also used Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook initiatives to drive voter registration in Wisconsin.
Lundin’s multi-award winning documentary, Jens Jensen The Living Green, is available on Amazon Prime and aired on PBS stations nationwide. The film just won an international communications award from the American Society of Landscape Architects.
Curious about Chicago parks today, the film spawned the production of a companion short, Jardincito, as well as numerous speaking engagements, on the power of nature to help one find their voice, grow as an artist and become a powerful activist, like Jens Jensen.
Carey developed her political savvy as Creative Director of Adelsen / Liston (A/L Media), a major political media firm in Chicago, working with federal, state and judicial races, public health campaigns (organ donation, stop smoking Chicago, EPA, ride-sharing) and corporate clients such as NEC, FMC and Allstate. Her multi award-winning Gift of Hope campaign helped Illinois reach the highest organ donor registry in the nation.
Today, Lundin is developing a campaign to get out the vote called FlipItBlue.
Lundin has held various managing producer roles for television series such as:
Unsolved Mysteries, Treasure Hunters Roadshow, America’s Best Bites, Phenomenon: The Lost Archives, Interactions in Science, Technology and Society and the Emmy nominated, CPS Right Now.
Lundin has bachelors from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in History and began her career at Wisconsin Public Television in Madison.
THE WORST TRAVEL SHOW DIRECTED AND CO-WRITTEN BY CAREY LUNDIN
How did you get into the business? I started at Wisconsin Public Television as a student crew person who did location sound, studio camerawork, and production assistance and worked my way up to associate producer of a few of their series.
What obstacles have you faced specifically because of your gender? I find that in order to be respected as the director, that I have to deal with young men wanting to take over if I hesitate for a moment – recently, the male producer called “cut” while I was waiting for the improvising actor to finish the scene!
And I’m also responsible for contributing to this issue – I create self-doubt where there’s no need for it.
Best thing to ever happen to you to remind you that you are a woman? I’ve developed female characters and done docs about empathetic and altruistic people who had troubled lives, I think that there are thousands of stories waiting to be told now and it’s great to be a woman because I can see the nuances and entertainment value waiting to be tapped.
Work you are most proud of? I think all of my work is flawed, but I love having done a lot of the work, I love directing and I love going out to the world with a fake character and watching people react. This is the premise behind Citizen Kate and the recent The Worst Travel Show for Facebook Watch and WatchMojo.
How do you describe the most significant #metoo moment of your life? I have been grossly overlooked and maybe even contributed to this narrative because when I graduated in the mid-80s my film professor told me that although I was a talented director, “there are no female directors” and I should become an art director or producer. Although I’ve won a lot of awards for commercials, web series, documentaries and TV series I’ve created and directed, I still sorta believe this in the back of my head.
How have professional attitudes towards women evolved during your career? Well, there are certainly a lot more women in every position now than there were before. But a lot of the professional attitudes have not changed.
Trapped on an island what essentials must you have? Do you mean one without internet service? If so, books, lots of them and a film projector and films and a 16mm movie camera and lots of stock – so some day I could make a doc about my life on the island!
If you had a time machine, what would you say to your past self? Don’t believe society’s dismissal of you because of your sex — plow forward and own it.
If you could have a one-on-one with anyone who would it be? And why? There are too many people but I’d love to talk with Stanley Kubrick about how he made his choices and how he stuck to his guns no matter what people said.
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