By Jessica Mansfield
The Australian Government has today revealed the 58 recipients of Screen Australia’s Gender Matters: Brilliant Stories and Brilliant Careers, marking the largest cohort of projects funded in a single day in the agency’s history.
A combined 45 story ideas and 13 industry projects led by Australian women will share in more than $3 million of funding. For Brilliant Stories, these funds will enable creative teams to fast track the development of their creative concepts, and for Brilliant Careers, the funds will help implement business proposals to grow careers and create work opportunities for female filmmakers.
“Gender Matters is unashamedly providing express-lane access to female business ideas and stories. The funding boost provided by Screen Australia has been a game-changer, providing the industry with an opportunity to get behind some very commercial and creative prospects. It’s now time for action,” said Screen Australia Chief Operating Officer, Fiona Cameron.
The Brilliant Stories slate includes funding for 45 different projects, all with female filmmakers telling female stories: 18 feature films, 16 television concepts, and 11 online projects.
The feature film concepts include Ride Like A Girl, the story of the first woman to win the Melbourne Cup (with Rachel Griffiths making her feature film directing debut). Recipients also include 2015 NSW Young Australian of the Year, Genevieve Clay-Smith, whose work in supporting underrepresented people will continue with Baby Cat, a tale of a vivacious young woman with Down Syndrome determined to make it on the international krumping stage.
Television projects include Sixteen, a sci-fi tale of sixteen girls who disappear on a three night hike and return pregnant – carrying a new species. Diana Glenn and Offspring’s Kat Stewart and Jane Harber also move behind the camera into first-time writing roles with The Elementals, penning the tale of a group of washed-up superheroes in a share house, wrestling with their responsibilities to save the planet and their desire to do very little.
The online slate features Triple Oh!, following the antics of a mismatched pair of ambulance paramedics. In Sheilas, two sisters dramatically explore the forgotten and most ‘badass’ women in Australia, and Good Grief is a funny and touching series on the inevitability and inconvenience of grief and mourning.
Gender Matters was announced in December 2015 as a direct response to the identified gender imbalance in lead creative roles across the screen sector. The disparity is most notable in traditional film with just 32% of women working as producers, 23% as writers and only 16% as directors. Brilliant Stories and Brilliant Careers are part of the broader $5 million Gender Matters program, with the aim to ensure Screen Australia’s production funding is targeted to creative teams that are at least 50% female by the end of 2018.
