Creator Highlight: Janecka Deer-Olen of Scream Queen Podcast

By: Myriam Akbar

Janecka Deer-Olen is a determined and fiery Florida-based content creator, who explores themes of horror both real and imagined. She has a daughter who is the drummer in a local band that is gaining popularity and a husband who owns a small music venue in Orlando. Deer-Olen has been making social media content for 7 months; however, she’s had her podcast for a year. Additionally, she hosts horror trivia events at her husband’s venue. She says the best part of creating content is the community that she gets to form; however, she explains that there are some hardships that come along with it. “I'm still fighting for recognition in a space that is saturated and where my values and the topics I cover are being shadow banned. It makes it hard but I won't stop,” she says. 

Deer-Olen’s passion for visual arts began as a child, having grandparents who shared the same interest. Her grandmother Harriet Deer, was a Professor of English at the University of South Florida. She was known for her work in Popular Culture studies and film, giving lectures on classic films at the Tampa Theatre and USF into her 90's. She and her husband also co-authored four books on The Popular Arts. Deer-Olen says, “I got my passion for film from my grandmother, as we were very close. I just took it in a different direction with horror.” Her favorite categories within the genre are body, psychological, creature features, thrillers, revenge, and slashers. The television shows that introduced her to the genre were Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed, Tales from the Crypt, and Goosebumps. As for films, she lists Evil Dead 2, Chucky, The Nightmare on Elm Street, Dolls by Suart Gordon, and The Witches. 

Deer-Olen started her podcast a year ago, highlighting the true horrors that inspired the horrors on screen. She has a segment called Indie Horror Highlights and also interviews Indie Horror directors. “I say at the end of each episode: This is a one woman show and I'm doing my very best. Everything is done by me,” she says. Within a year, she has completed 50 episodes and gained quite an Instagram following, with over 11K followers. “It takes a lot of time and patience, but it's worth it to me because I get to create a safe place for people who are being targeted. I get to give a different perspective, which I’m proud of. The horror space is overrun by men and it's rare to see an independent woman podcaster that doesn't have a man helping at all,” she says. 

When asked if she was interested in filmmaking, Deer-Olen said, “Everything I create, read, and write is intended to help me formulate my craft. This knowledge is essential to completing my screenplay and making my first horror short.” She is working on a claymation short about a recurring nightmare she had as a child. Her short-term goals are to gain a big enough following that she is taken seriously as a writer and possible director down the line. Her long-term goal is to make horror movies about issues that are important to her, ones that she feel haven’t been tackled yet with enough significance. “I am going to piss people off and make people uncomfortable with my art. I don't mean to play it safe or appease the masses,” she says.