Lindenwood Magazine - Spring 2018: Connecting to Alumni and Friends

Lindenwood University ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT 7 CAMPUS NEWS ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT UPCOMING EVENTS LINDENWOOD SPORTS ALUMNI EVENTS AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS ALUMNI NEWS & NOTES LINDENWOOD Spring 2018 St. Louis native Jeff Keane (’92) has a firm grip on reality— reality television, that is. Keane got his start in communications in college, spending parts of four years at Miami University of Ohio and completing his degree in mass communications at Lindenwood in 1992. While attending Lindenwood, Keane had a shift at KCLC 89.1 FM, calling it a great experience. “Getting that firsthand experience at the radio station and doing some of the things I really liked to do was a lot of fun,” he said. After a stint in Lexington, Ky., Keane and his wife moved back to St. Louis, where he worked at a local ad agency and as a freelancer. In 2002, he started Coolfire Studios. “I felt like I always wanted to have my own business, and I felt like I was finally ready,” he said. Coolfire began as a commercial and post-production company, but Keane had bigger ideas, adding reality TV, digital entertainment, and interactive media to the mix. “We could have remained a commercial production company and still have a successful business, but I always wanted to grow it into something bigger that had a little bit more to offer,” he said. He longed to do something more creative than commercials, which led to reality television. “It was an opportunity to tell longer form and more creative stories than 30-second TV spots or short corporate videos.” By leveraging the Midwest location often overlooked by coastal production houses, Keane found great characters, developed concepts, and was able to sell television shows. The first ideas from Coolfire to make it to air were Fast N’ Loud on Discovery and Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s on OWN. Coolfire partnered with Pilgrim Films to get those first two shows on the air, but in 2012, the company was able to get its own shows to television: Mom Friends Forever on Nickelodeon and Resale Royalty on Style. “There’s a tremendous amount of blood, sweat, and tears that goes into creating and producing a TV show, and when you finally see it on the screen, there’s a great sense of satisfaction.” Keane said. Keane said he has encountered people during his travels who have told him how much they enjoyed shows produced by Coolfire, including a cab driver from Ireland and an American couple he met in Costa Rica. “When you run into somebody who has seen it and likes it, that feels really good, because that’s what you’re trying to do,” he said. “You’re trying to put something out there that people are going to enjoy and something that’s going to entertain people. And when you get that feedback from a stranger that they’ve seen it, that they like it, they enjoy it that you’ve entertained them, that’s a really good feeling.” Keane said Coolfire has about 50 ideas in various stages of development at any given time. The goal is to get bigger and better at what we’re doing,” he said. There’s a tremendous amount of blood, sweat, and tears that goes into creating and producing a TV show, and when you finally see it on the screen, there’s a great sense of satisfaction.” Jeff Keane “ THE REALITY OF JEFF KEANE ALUMNUS BUILDS MEDIA PRODUCTION COMPANY by CHUCK MCPHERSON