Austin-Based Author Robert Bryce Partners with Tyson Culver for JUICE: How Electricity Explains the World Documentary

Austin-based director Tyson Culver and fellow Austinite, author Robert Bryce, announce a documentary project entitled, "Juice: How Electricity Explains The World." The film, based on Bryce's forthcoming book of the same name, has taken them to several continents to interview people about electricity, the world's most-important and fastest-growing form of energy. They talked to a Nobel-prize winning economist, a California gubernatorial candidate, cryptocurrency miners, a video-game pioneer and dozens of others. They have been to India, Lebanon, Iceland and several U.S. states. Puerto Rico and South Korea are next. "Juice" is in the final stages of production and will be released in tandem with "Juice" (the book) in early 2019. Check out the sizzle reel here. For more information on the movie, please see www.juicethemovie.com.

"We face lots of tough challenges: climate change, women's rights, income inequality," explains Bryce. "But the defining inequality in the world today is the chasm between the High-Watt and No-Watt worlds; it's the disconnect between the electricity rich and the electricity poor." He continued, "Electricity inequality matters most to women and girls. Today, some 2.5 billion women around the world are still washing clothes by hand. Electricity frees women and girls from the pump, the stove and the washtub."

Over the last three decades, Bryce has published five books and more than 1,000 articles. His byline has appeared in numerous publications ranging from THE WALL Street Journal and Atlantic Monthly to USA Today and the New York Times. His most recent book, "Smaller Faster Lighter Denser Cheaper: How Innovation Keeps Proving the Catastrophists Wrong," was published in 2014.

"We had to Fuse Robert's voice and book with my vision for the movie," says Culver. "We found that we weren't producing an energy documentary, we were producing an electricity documentary. We realized we didn't have to argue the issue. Instead, we just had to ask people questions about electricity and what it means to them. Then we let them tell their stories."

"Juice" writer/producer Robert Bryce with director of photography John Moody, at Gulfoss Falls, Iceland, Oct. 2017 (photo credit: Matthew Wallis)

Culver, the founder of Austin-based C2C Media, continued, "We learned that lesson in Beirut. After we landed at the airport - before we even got to our hotel - our driver, Hussein Mousl, told us everything we needed to know about the generator mafia." Blackouts are so common in Lebanon that an entire illegal industry has sprung up to provide electricity when the grid fails.

In addition to Bryce and Culver, other key members of the "Juice" production team are: Emmy-nominated producer Matthew L. Wallis and three-time Emmy and PGA-award-winning producer, John Moody, the film's director of photography (bios below). During their two-year production effort, Bryce and Culver UNCOVERED some staggering facts:

About 3.3 billion people around the world are using less electricity than what's consumed by an average American refrigerator.
The power density needed to grow marijuana indoors is nearly equal to what's required inside a data center run by Amazon or Google.
The average American uses as much electricity in three weeks as the average resident of India uses in a year.

Energy politics are tribal. People want to believe that certain forms of energy are good and others are bad. Bryce and Culver hope "Juice" will move the energy discussion BEYOND tribalism so we can understand that blackouts and electricity shortages - which afflict BILLIONS of people around the world - are the real enemy.

"The message of the film," says Bryce, "is simple: DARKNESS kills human potential. Electricity nourishes it."

Adds Culver, "Electricity does, in fact, explain the world. We're going to show you how."
An unidentified man, Joyashree Roy, Prasengit Paul and Dana Hernandez discuss water treatment and electricity with "Juice" writer/producer Robert Bryce at Dhapdhapi High School, Ramnagar, India, Dec. 2016 (photo credit: Lorin Bryce)

ABOUT ROBERT BRYCE (WRITER / PRODUCER):

Robert has been writing - and talking - about energy for nearly 30 years, covering everything from Enron's bankruptcy and the digitization of drilling rigs to nuclear energy and the future of batteries. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications, ranging from THE WALL Street Journal to USA Today, and Atlantic Monthly to The New York Times. He has also appeared on a host of TV and radio shows on numerous outlets including BBC, MSNBC, Fox, Al Jazeera, CNN, PBS and NPR. Robert is the author of five books including, most recently, "Smaller Faster Lighter Denser Cheaper: How Innovation Keeps Proving the Catastrophists Wrong," which was released in 2014. His sixth book, "Juice: How Electricity Explains The World," will be released in early 2019 by his longtime publisher, PublicAffairs. For more on him, see: www.robertbryce.com.

ABOUT TYSON CULVER (DIRECTOR / PRODUCER):

Tyson is the owner of C2C Media, an Austin-based video production company. For the past 20 years, he's produced commercials and branded content for numerous national and international brands, including Whole Foods Market, SONIC Drive-In, MTV, VH1 and Brooks Brothers. Tyson honed his craft as a producer and editor with the SPIKE and Comedy Central crews, creating network-branded trailers and promos for multiple entertainment properties. Chief among those projects was "Lone Survivor," featuring an intimate conversation between Marcus Luttrell and the stars of the film, for which he won a Silver Telly. In 2014, Tyson produced and edited his first independent feature, "3 Days." Later that year, he was brought in to deliver the biopic "21 Years: Richard Linklater." In 2015, he produced and edited his third feature film, "Cabin Crew," which recently sold to Flix Premiere. For more on Tyson and C2C, see: www.c2cmedia.tv.

Photo Credit: Lorin Bryce