Lyons has written, directed and produced three feature films and three short documentaries. He uses the medium to bring issues to the masses and inspire political or social change. The environmental horror feature, Unearth, which he co-directed with his wife and partner, Dorota Swies, had its World Premiere during the pandemic of 2020 at the renowned Fantasia International Film Festival. He and co-writer Kelsey Goldberg were later awarded Best Screenplay at El Festival de Cine Fantastico de Canarias Isla Calavera. The film stars Adrienne Barbeau and Marc Blucas and is releases worldwide in Summer 2021. In 2017, he produced the short film OurErie which was viewed over 100K times in 48 hours and received raves by James Fallows in The Atlantic. With his previous features, Schism (2009) and There Are No Goodbyes (2013), Lyons focused his lens on the topics of mental health, aging, working class struggles and fate vs. free will. Made on a shoestring budget, the features screened globally, and are available on Amazon VOD.In addition, Lyons served as the Executive Director of the non-profit Film Society of Northwestern Pennsylvania for its first 9 years, where he now continues to serve as Director of Programming. John is also an active teaching artist and a member of the Green New Deal Coalition. His efforts brought attention to local media resulting in Erie Arts and Culture's Bruce Morton Wright Artist of the Year Award (2020), Erie Reader's 40 Under 40 (2013), Young Erie Professionals Generation-E Leadership Award (2009), Erie Times-News' People of the Year (2007) Erie Reader's Best Filmmaker Award (2014-2017, 2020) . Lyons is a producer of the Our Erie podcast (2020-), a host of the Film Grain podcast (2018-) and host/producer of the Cinemactivist podcast (2021-). Show less «