Hon Mr Paul Fletcher MP Federal Minister for Communications

Hon Mr Paul Fletcher MP Federal Minister for Communications SUBMISSION TO PARLIAMENTARY INQUIRY INTO AUSTRALIA’S CREATIVE AND CULTURAL INDUSTRIES AND INSITUTIONS Dear Mr Fletcher, I am a career film and television producer. Through our company Ruby Entertainment, my business partner Mark Ruse ( sadly and recently deceased) and I have been making programs on Australian screens (large and small) for Australian and International Audiences , for over 20 years. Some of our credits include Kath and Kim, Crackerjack, Bed of Roses, and The Secret River, all of which won for us the Screen Producers Australia (SPA) “Producer of the Year Award” in their years of release. We have also won numerous other screen industry awards, including ACTAA’s and most recently the Logie for Best Mini-Series for The Secret River. Producing is a role of both creative and business leadership. Through my work I have had the great privilege of working with, and supporting the talents of, many Australian creative practitioners, including writers, directors, actors, musicians , composers, cinematographers etc. I take great pleasure in collaborating to ‘convert’ these individual creative outputs into the shared art form of the screen story – either as feature film or television series. As you will see from my output listed above (and via the more extensive listing on IMDb here https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0523995/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0), my major concern has always been to find an Australian voice in screen storytelling. Whether it be in comedy, drama or documentary, television or cinema, I am always looking for something distinctively Australian, which explores our culture and values, and expresses our unique take on life and the world. And always in a context of connecting with audiences and providing entertainment (hence our company name!) The interests of the screen sector generally are represented in other forums, but to this Inquiry I would like to speak specifically to the value of literary works , and the great capacity they have to add value to the screen sector via film or television adaptation. It has long been recognized in Hollywood that novels are a major source from which to develop quality screen stories. At the extreme high end, think of the massive impact of ‘Harry Potter’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ both as best-selling novels and blockbuster films. In the local context, ‘My Brilliant Career’ ,’Picnic at Hanging Rock’, ‘The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith’, all classics of Australian cinema, were derived for novels. On television think of ‘The Thorn Birds’, ‘The Slap’, ‘Miss Fisher’’s Murder Mysteries’ and our own ‘The Secret River’, all award winning adaptations of best-selling and acclaimed literary works. The upcoming ‘Boy Swallows Universe’ promises to be a huge success. These are just a few examples from a vast inventory. The cultural value is obvious in terms of public profile and engagement. The economic value is probably less known outside industry circles, but is worth pointing out here: every adaptation of a literary work results in anywhere between $5million (for a film) and $20+million ( for an ongoing TV series) of production related economic activity in the screen sector. This includes employment of hundred of people per project in the artistic and technical professions. Beyond production there is further activity generated amongst broadcasters, advertisers, cinema exhibitors, distributors, sales agents , merchandisers etc. This can be the economic knock on effect of just one novel. As a producer, I am continually on the lookout for a novel which can help create all this. As well as “The Secret River”, I have produced adaptations of Shane Maloney’s comic crime novels featuring ‘Murray Whelan’, who was played by David Wenham, with screenplays by the late great John Clarke, and directed by Clarke and Sam Neill in his directorial debut. I hold options on a number of current Australian literary works, including Clare Wright’s Stella Prize-winning history ‘The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka’, which we are adapting into an 8 part mini-series with US collaborators. This promises to be a marvellous rollicking drama about the unsung women who contributed to our famed Eureka rebellion. A story which must be told ! The wonderful thing about working with literary material is that the writer of the literary piece has already done the massive amount of research and storytelling work that is required to make a screen story connect with an audience. Having worked closely with literary writers on these adaptations, I have become increasingly aware of just how much dedicated work is involved in the creation of the original material, and – just as noteworthy for this Inquiry – how little reward authors receive for these massive efforts. Recent research has show that writers earn on average about $12,000 for a literary work .The enjoyment, entertainment and learning they provide for the vast reading audience out there, and the often years of intense work it has required to complete their product, is just not recompensed with income commensurate to the effort ,or to the cultural and economic value contributed to the reading public and the industries which serve them ( bookshops, libraries, festivals, schools). COVID has obviously made a huge impact across all sectors. The particularly precarious position of the Arts sector has been well highlighted. The general lack of support for the sector in comparison to others is distressing for those of us who dedicate our working lives in this sphere ,but it is fortuitous in a way that it has been highlighted, because this gives the wider community, represented by Government, to address the issue and redress the imbalance. It is only when artistic activity diminishes as it has during 2020, that the community becomes aware that they miss it and need it. It has also become apparent that the wider community does not really know how the creative industries work, and what artists need to do to survive and to get their products out there. As a direct beneficiary of the work of literary authors, I implore the Inquiry to consider comprehensively the difficult circumstances faced by writers generally, and particularly in the current circumstances. Because they often work alone for long periods of time, they often only make ‘appearances’ at the time of publication. This can cause us to forget that they are working away every day to create the works that will eventually have all sorts of cultural and economic impacts - like a film adaptation. We as a community need to recognise and support this unsung work , and to acknowledge that writers need to be supported while they are working, and not just when their work comes to our attention, which is usually at the end of a very long process. Just because we can’t see it, does not mean it is not happening, nor does it mean that the ‘work in progress’ cannot have huge economic, employment and cultural impacts once it is finally released into the world. I understand the Federal Government funding in this sector has diminished substantially in recent years. Of all the artistic forms, writing ha perhaps the longest hidden gestation period, and is thus the most ‘unsung’. As the Inquiry is charged with a comprehensive investigation of the whole creative industries, I would ask that you give attention to the particular difficulties of the literary sector, and to strategies that financially support the long-range work being undertaken by dedicated creative whose aspiration is to give us all something of cultural significance, economic value, and ultimately of legacy which articulates and preserves for us our collective Australian voice. Thank you for considering this submission. Very Best Regards Stephen Luby Producer 19th October 2020 .

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