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OKay Productions is like many Los Angeles production companies: it produces short films, commercials, and music videos. But there’s one thing that sets it apart — it was created and is made up almost entirely of IU alumni.

Owen Klee, president of OKay Productions, graduated from IU with a Bachelor of Arts in Media in 2024. Klee said the production company was born at IU when he produced a film with Ethan Neihart, BFA’24, and Carter Burkhart, BFA’24, current co-founders of OKay Productions, and a group of around 20 other people. Klee said the group decided to continue working on films together throughout the year and create as many projects as possible.

“We started making commercials for students who had started making their own clothing on campus or for bands who were making their own music,” Klee said. “We also made some short films for people who had ideas, who wanted stuff to get done and we just ended up making this little team of people who all worked together.”

The summer after graduation, Neihart went to LA for The Media School’s Semester in LA program and decided to stay there. Klee soon followed suit.

“A bunch of my other friends who I had worked with all moved out to Los Angeles, and they were like, ‘you gotta come,’” Klee said.

Since he moved to LA, Klee has continued to improve OKay Productions — named after his initials, ‘OK’. Klee said since there are so many Indiana-based people that live in LA, there is a good base of IU alumni.

“It’s worked pretty well,” he said. “When we market ourselves to other people, they like that we’re all kind of this ragtag group of kids that have this Midwest heart and soul because most of us are from Indiana.”

The Media School introduced a B.F.A. in cinematic arts in 2020, so several of the alumni now involved with the production company were part of the second cohort to graduate from the newly established program at IU. Klee credited his time at IU for the community he’s built and for much of his successes.

“I don’t even know if I would be here in LA without IU,” he said. “Even though the film school was smaller and just beginning, and while we were there it might’ve seemed like not everything was in our favor or there were all these obstacles to jump through, it really made you more determined and thick-skinned. If you really wanted to do something, you could get it done because there are other people who also want to do it.”

Now, Klee is focused on overseeing post-production of OKay Productions’ upcoming TV pilot, “Rock is Dead.” Klee said it is their capstone project of 2025, which has been worked on tirelessly over the past year. The pilot is about a group of kids from LA who are trying to bring back rock music and explore the process of trying to revitalize that genre.

The pilot will premiere in March in Toronto, and in April in LA. Klee said the goal is for the pilot to be bought by a distributor or someone who wants to help fund the rest of the series.

“It’s really fun, it’s filled with music and young people, and it’s a funny good time,” Klee said. “It makes you feel like you’re hanging out with a whole bunch of people, and it’s got that nostalgic feel to it, so I’m really excited for it.”

For current IU students looking to pursue a career in film production, Klee offered a piece of advice.

“There’s always going to be a new door for you to walk through. You will have the opportunity to open that door, but make sure you have the right key,” Klee said. “There will be all this opportunity for you here and it’s waiting for you, but you really have to be the one to open that door and step through it.

You have to be confident in the skill set that you have, even if it’s something you’ve never done before, just be confident enough to know that whatever you don’t know, you can learn. You are capable of doing whatever anybody else around you is doing.”

For more information, follow OKay Productions on Instagram or visit its website.