Fred Peabody - PRODUCER/WRITER/DIRECTOR
Fred Peabody produced, wrote, and directed the Emmy-nominated 2016 feature documentary ALL GOVERNMENTS LIE and the 2018 feature documentary THE CORPORATE COUP D’ÉTAT. The films premiered at TIFF and HOT DOCS respectively, and received high ratings on ARTE, ZDF, and STARZ. ALL GOVERNMENTS LIE won the Directors Guild (DGC) Allan King Award for Excellence in Documentary. Fred is an Emmy-winning journalist and filmmaker whose credits include 7 years as producer-director at ABC 20/20 (where he won an Emmy and received 4 Emmy nominations), and 7 years as producer-director on the CBC investigative series The Fifth Estate.

Ziya Tong - CO-DIRECTOR
Award-winning science journalist Ziya Tong co-directed PLASTIC PEOPLE, which premiered at SXSW 2024 where it was a top 10 staff favourite and profiled for its groundbreaking findings in The New York Times. It’s been called “An absolutely terrifying piece of detective work,” with Variety calling Plastic People “An essential state-of-our-world documentary.” Tong was co-host of Daily Planet, Discovery Channel’s long-running flagship science program. Her book The Reality Bubble was shortlisted for the prestigious RBC Taylor Prize in 2020, and won the Lane Anderson Prize for best science writing in Canada. It has won praise from prominent authors, including Naomi Klein and David Suzuki, who calls Tong’s book “Required reading for all who care about what we are doing to the planet.” Tong also hosted the CBC’s Emmy-nominated series ZeD, PBS’s national prime-time series, Wired Science, and worked as a correspondent for NOVA scienceNOW alongside Neil deGrasse Tyson on PBS. Tong served as Vice Chair of the World Wildlife Fund Canada, and is currently on the board of directors of WWF International.

Peter Raymont - Executive Producer
Founder and President of White Pine Pictures, Peter Raymont is Filmmaker in Residence at UofT’s Massey College. He served as both producer and executive producer on Fred Peabody’s previous films, ALL GOVERNMENTS LIE and THE CORPORATE COUP D’ÉTAT, and was executive producer on PLASTIC PEOPLE, a co-production with Telus Originals that premiered recently at SXSW. Raymont is an Emmy-winning filmmaker, journalist and writer who has produced and directed more than 100 documentary films and series during his 53 year career. His films are informed with a passion for human rights and social justice. His documentary feature “Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Roméo Dallaire” won the 2007 Emmy Award for Best Documentary and the 2005 Sundance Festival Audience Award for World Cinema Documentaries. Raymont's 2007 film “A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman” was short-listed for an Academy Award.

Jeff Cohen - Executive Producer
Jeff Cohen was EP on 3 White Pine Pictures films: ALL GOVERNMENTS LIE, THE CORPORATE COUP D’ÉTAT, and DIGITAL TSUNAMI. He was founding director of the Park Center for Independent Media at Ithaca College, where he taught journalism for 10 years. He founded FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting), a leading U.S. media watchdog group. Jeff has been a consultant and/or interviewee on many award-winning documentaries, including “Shadows of Liberty”, “War Made Easy”, “Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism”, and “The Panama Deception”. He’s been a commentator at CNN and MSNBC and is the author of “Cable News Confidential: My Misadventures in Corporate Media”.

Simon Nasht - Producer/Writer
One of Australia’s most experienced documentary filmmakers, Simon Nasht is a former political journalist for The Age and ABC, and spent many years working internationally for leading broadcasters and newspapers. Nasht ran successful production companies in London, Budapest and New York before returning to Australia to create Smith&Nasht with entrepreneur Dick Smith. Nasht’s films have won Logies, Awgies, AFI and the Eureka Prize for science journalism. He was the first filmmaker to be nominated for the Australian Prime Minister’s History Prize. In 2014 he launched the independent distributor Screen Impact, and in 2018 formed DNX Media, a partnership with December Media to produce long-form content. He is a former teacher at the European Film College in Denmark.

Dr. Rick Smith - EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/INTERVIEWEE
Dr. Rick Smith is President of the Canadian Climate Institute, and was Executive Producer and a major interviewee on the 2024 feature documentary PLASTIC PEOPLE. From 2012 to 2021, Rick was Executive Director of the Broadbent Institute. He co-authored Slow Death by Rubber Duck: How the Toxicity of Everyday Life Affects Our Health (2009) and Toxin Toxout: Getting Harmful Chemicals Out of Our Bodies and Our World (2013). Rick believes PLANET ON FIRE will be well-supported by Canadian and U.S. climate science and wildfire prevention organizations.

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