Host a Screening of The Plastic Detox
We’re partnering with the filmmakers at OPS to encourage you to host screenings of the eye-opening new Netflix documentary film, The Plastic Detox to help raise awareness of the plastic health crisis and advance effective solutions to address it.
Run time: 90 minutes.
Synopsis: Released globally on Netflix on March 16, 2026, The Plastic Detox reveals the startling effects plastics and toxic chemicals are having on our bodies and health. This new documentary will help reframe the global plastic problem — a core driver of fossil fuel demand — as an urgent public health issue.
Plastic isn’t just a pollution issue. It’s personal. Microplastics and toxic chemicals are in our brains, our blood, and our unborn children – with health risks linked to rising rates of chronic illnesses like cancer. This chemical exposure is harming millions of people’s fertility and stealing their right to a family. Our bodies are no place for plastic.
We hope you will host a screening of this groundbreaking film and include a panel discussion afterwards to raise awareness and provide your audience members with tangible solutions to reduce their plastic exposure and opportunities to advance systemic policy change. Follow the steps below to help ensure a smooth, well-attended and deeply impactful event.
** Important: community screenings can be held any time from April 16, 2026 on, but not before. **
Reserve a Great Venue for Your Event
Timing. Schedule your event as far in advance as possible (at least a month) as it takes time to locate a good venue and promote your event. Remember that screenings must take place on or after April 16, 2026, to comply with Netflix’s terms and conditions. As of now, there is no end date for hosting community screenings.
Space. Pick a community-friendly space that is easy to access and either has ample parking or is easy to reach via public transit. Types of venues you may wish to consider include your local library, community center, museum, town hall or city hall, church, synagogue, mosque, food co-op, and elementary school, high school, or college auditorium.
Free only! Per the distributor’s requirements, all community screenings must be free of charge. Please note that many movie theaters must charge admission so make sure to discuss that aspect up front if you approach a theater and/or choose another type of venue that can host without requiring an entry fee.
Accessing the Film.
If you’re partnering with a film festival, movie theater, or another large institutional venue with a huge screen, please let us know when you fill out our form below so we can get your venue the Digital Cinema Packet via media shuttle to ensure that it is high enough quality for the big screen.
If you hold your screening at a smaller venue, please note that you will need:
An active Netflix account through which you can access the film.
A strong Internet connection for streaming the film (if there is no WiFi at the venue you choose, you can download the film to your device in advance)
A projector or another way to connect your computer to a projector screen or empty wall.
Share Your Event Details with Us! Don’t forget to let us know when and where you’ll be hosting your screening by filling out this short form. This step is very important to enable us to keep track of what’s happening where so we can keep OPS, the folks who made this film and are partnering with us to provide free community screenings, updated about the film’s reach.
Set an attendance goal. Based on the space you’ll be using, you should set a realistic goal for how many people you want to attend. Ideally, the space will be full but not overflowing (you must abide by posted occupancy limits) and there must be seating available for everyone. Please note, if you expect to draw a crowd of at least 50 people, we encourage you to partner with a local bookstore to sell copies of Beyond Plastics’ new book, “The Problem with Plastic.”In our experience, audience members may feel shaken and overwhelmed following the screening and it can be helpful to provide attendees with a guide to both immediate solutions to enact meaningful policy changes and advice for how to reduce their own exposure to plastics and their toxic chemical additives - all of which they can find in our book! Find more details about the book here.
Line Up an Experienced Moderator and Strong Panelists for Your Follow-up Discussion. Choose a group leader and/or someone who is familiar with plastic pollution as your moderator. You can invite medical professionals (recommended!), local elected officials, scientists, and environmental advocates to join the panel. We recommend that your post-screening panel feature no more than three speakers and that you leave plenty of time for questions and answers.
Request Bios and Headshots from your Panelists and Moderator. You will need their titles and bios to include in the media advisory, and you’ll need their headshots to customize your promotional graphics.
Collect RSVPs Online. Set up a way for people to RSVP online, whether it’s via Googleforms (you’re welcome to make a copy of our sample screening RSVP Googleform here), Evite, Action Network (you’re welcome to use our sample Action Network event RSVP as a model), Eventbrite, or another tool. In addition to letting you know if you’re running up against space constraints or need to do more promotion to boost RSVPs, collecting RSVPs gives you an easy way to share reminders to ensure people show up and can also be a great email list-building tool for your organization. You may also want to allow people to submit questions in advance to help get the discussion rolling after viewing and allow your panelists and moderator to prepare. Even if you only ask people to RSVP via email, do that!
Make a Digital Flier & Social Media Graphics. You’re welcome to adapt them template flier and graphics in our sharing toolkit to make this a light lift. Please note that these templates are all in Canva and will require you to edit them in that program. You can create a free account if you don’t have one already.
Promote, Promote, Promote. Submit a listing for your event to your local events calendar(s) and newspaper(s), invite your local elected officials, send a note asking people who run environmental and other relevant listservs or lead local groups asking them to share the invitation with their networks, and send a number of reminders to your own contacts and email list. Use the newsletter blurb, sample posts and graphics in the sharing toolkit to make your promotions stand out!
Create a Detailed Run-of-Show. Write out a clear schedule that leaves plenty of time for Q&A. Assign a moderator and someone to run the technology for your event. Ask your moderator to write out their questions and key points ahead of time and share them with you. You can also ask people to submit questions when they register that your moderator can review in advance. Click here for a sample run-of- show you can adapt.
Schedule a Practice Run. Find a time that works for all your panelists, moderator, and tech person to meet at the event space a few days before your event to run through everything and practice the flow of the event and check your tech. Test your streaming set up to ensure that you can show the film, that there are no glitches, that the quality is clear, that the volume is loud enough, etc. It’s important to troubleshoot these issues ahead of time, not the day of. A few things to keep in mind:
If the WiFi strength/speed at the venue you’ve chosen is weak/slow, you can avoid problems by downloading the film onto your laptop, tablet, or another device from which to stream it, rather than livestreaming it from Netflix. In fact, even if the WiFi at the venue you’ve chosen is strong, we recommend that you download the film in advance to provide a fallback option should any unforeseen issues arise the day of your screening. Click here for Netflix’s directions on how to download content to a device. ⬇️
There’s a chance you may run into some issues projecting the film from Netflix (all the more reason to do a test run!) If you do have trouble, check out Netflix’s guidance on projecting here. If all else fails, try disabling “hardware acceleration” - click here for more information on how to do that. ⚙️
Invite the Media. Issue a media advisory to let local reporters know about your event. Click here for a media advisory template you can customize.
Send Reminders! People have busy lives so plan to send out three reminders to everyone who RSVPs. This is our recommended timing for the reminder emails:
One week before the event
One day before the event
The day of your event
Follow Up.
After your event ends, send an email to everyone who signed up/attended to thank them, share resources, and urge them to get involved. Feel free to adapt our sample follow up email here.
Please let us and the film makers know how your screening went and what questions came up. Share your highlights.
Questions? If you have any issues or questions, please contact Diana Hernandez, Beyond Plastics managing director at dianahernandez@bennington.edu.
SAMPLE MEDIA ADVISORY
This is your chance to get some media coverage of your event so let reporters know it’s coming up and make your media advisory count using our tips below. Click here to use our media advisory template as a starting point.
Give it an eye-catching headline
Include your contact information at the top
Highlight your impressive local speakers
Include a quote or two so busy reporters can grab them for a piece
Keep it short
SAMPLE RUN-OF-SHOW
One of the keys to a successful event is drafting a clear run of show to guide your schedule. Make sure that everyone knows which pieces they are responsible for during the event to avoid any confusion. Schedule a practice run through a week to several days before the event. Click here for a sample run of show document you can adapt.
SAMPLE FOLLOW-UP EMAIL
It’s important to follow up with all the people who registered for your screening event right afterwards (ideally, the very next day!) To make that process easier, you can use our sample follow-up email as a starting point and customize it to fit your tone and organizational goals. Click here for the sample follow-up email.
SHARING TOOLKIT
Social media is a powerful tool to spread the word about your event and get more people to attend.
We’ve put together sample content including fliers, sample posts, a newsletter blurb, and social-media graphics that you can either use as-is or customize to promote the details of your specific screening event. Browse the toolkit to get started.