Find out how Australia’s leading drama executives choose the stories they bring to the screen.
9:30 am – 4:30 pm
The Cavanbah Centre
249 Ewingsdale Rd, Byron Bay
A one day seminar with screen industry executives presenting on what they are commissioning and producing and how they make their choices. They will also provide advice and key industry information on trends, how to get your projects in front of the decision makers and how to get your work noticed.
Anita Sheehan, Managing Director Porchlight Films
Jude Troy, Executive Vice President, TV Development and Acquisitions, Entertainment One
Penny Win, Head of Drama, Foxtel
Sophia Zachariou, Head of Development and Production, Screen NSW
Roger Monk, Development Producer for Essential Media (QLD)
Each of the guest speakers will give a presentation, facilitate round table discussions and participate in a panel discussion.
The seminar is for writers, directors, drama content creators and producers and anyone creating drama for cinema or television. Suited to early career and professional.
A rare opportunity to connect with key industry decision makers in an intimate and supportive professional environment.
Bios
Anita Sheehan
Managing Director and founding partner of Porchlight Films.
Porchlight is an independent Australian production company with a commitment to making distinctive cinema and television drama for local and international audiences.
Anita’s Executive Producer credits include The Kettering Incident an eight-part television drama series for Foxtel and BBC Worldwide; the feature Film The Rover (2013) starring Guy Pearce and Robert Pattinson and directed by David Michôd; Australian-German co-production Lore (2012) directed by Cate Shortland and the feature film The Hunter (2011), starring Willem Dafoe and directed by Daniel Nettheim. Porchlight is currently producing the film adaptation of the much-loved Australian novel Jasper Jones starring Toni Collette, Hugo Weaving and Levi Miller.
Anita’s first job in film and television was at Metro Screen and later at Southern Star. In 1996, she founded Porchlight Films with producers Liz Watts and brother Vincent Sheehan.
About Porchlight Films
Porchlight has built a reputation for producing high quality scripted drama for cinema and television. Our most recent television series, The Kettering Incident, is set in the mystical landscape of Tasmania. We wanted to tell a sophisticated story with strong scripts and bold, ambitious direction. The Kettering Incident is created for an audience that is hungry for the authentic and looking for deep, complex and real characters and relationships, but with plenty of genre flavours in the mix. Our latest feature film is an adaptation of Jasper Jones directed by Rachel Perkins and set in the south-west region of Western Australia. Both productions present universal stories set in a unique and particular ‘world’. Our ambition is to take premium Australian drama to local and international audiences by packaging sophisticated screen-writing with strong directorial vision and bankable on-screen talent. There’s no magic formula for success, but we believe that audiences have an appetite for well-told stories that fully exploit the visual and dramatic possibilities of the ‘screen’. We have a diverse slate of projects and we are supporting newer talent with smart ideas on a variety of platforms.
Jude Troy
Executive Vice President, TV Development & Acquisitions, Enertainment One ANZ
In February 2015, eOne Films Australia launched its local TV development & production arm with Jude at the helm. The division has projects in development with Netflix & Foxtel and is in early development on several shows for local networks.
Jude is working with some of Australia’s finest producers including Andrew Mason & Hopscotch Features, Goalpost, Robert Connolly’s Arena Media and Aquarius Films. She is working with exceptional writers including John Collee, Sarah Lambert, Gregor Jordan, Witi Ihimaera and a growing list of writing and directing talent through her professional networks around the globe.
She spent the last decade as Managing Director of eOne/Hopscotch Home Entertainment, handling acquisitions, sales, marketing and distribution. A former partner in Hopscotch, Jude grew the business dramatically using her acquisitions acumen to broaden and strengthen the slate to include top-rating TV, cutting edge documentary and classic and cult film re-issues. Many of Jude’s acquisitions have been at script stage. The TV slate includes international phenomenon’s like the The Inbetweeners, Miranda, Catastrophe, BBC drama hits Peaky Blinders & The Missing and pedigree drama Rectify and the Channel 4 series Indian Summers, ITV’s Frankenstein Chronicles and cult series Hannibal & From Dusk Til Dawn. The catalogue boasts a range of ground-breaking UK comedies like Peep Show, The Catherine Tate Show, IT Crowd & Green Wing, the Golden Globe nominated Jekyll, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, as well as a host of top-rating local productions including Rush, The Broken Shore, The Slap & Cleverman. Other titles include Peppa Pig, The Walking Dead and a raft of new and exciting drama from AMC – the home of Breaking Bad & Madmen. eOne is also partnered with US TV veteran, Mark Gordon and will distribute the highly anticipated Designated Survivor with Kiefer Sutherland. eOne is also producing the adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s Sharp Objects for HBO starring Amy Adamson and have several high end dramas in development and production with networks and platforms across the US, UK and Europe.
Jude was an EP on the AACTA award-winning All This Mayhem & plays an integral role in eOne Films theatrical acquisitions enjoying great success last year with her acquisition of Asif Kapadia’s, Oscar-winning Amy.
Pen
ny Win
Head of Drama – FOXTEL
Penny has worked in the media industry since 1987, when she started her career in Radio in New Zealand. Penny has worked in television in Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong throughout her 26 years in the industry, and is experienced in both Free to Air and Pay TV.
Penny came to Foxtel in 1996 after working at Star TV in Hong Kong and has managed the running of Foxtel’s drama channels since 2007. Penny has been involved in the commissioning of drama for the past four years and worked on the commissioning of Spirited, Wentworth, Devil’s Playground, Deadline Gallipoli and The Kettering Incident for the Foxtel network.
Sophia Zachariou
Head of Development and Production Screen NSW
Prior to joining Screen NSW Sophia Zachariou was Deputy Head of Entertainment at ABC TV and was the network EP on some of the highest rating programs on the ABC, including all of the Gruen programs, Kitchen Cabinet with Annabel Crabb, The Checkout, Judith Lucy’s Spiritual Journey and All Woman, The Chasers Media Circus, Hungry Beast, Agony Uncles and Aunts, Wednesday Night Fever, Elegant Gentleman’s Guide to Knife fighting, The Chaser’s War on Everything, the Saturday Night Crack Up and the ABC’s Live New Year’s Eve broadcast.
Sophia also developed unique digital formats for iView such as the hit comedy series, Fresh Blood and Canberra al desko with Annabel Crabb.
“I’ve been immensely proud of the shows I’ve been able to offer up to Australian audiences whilst at the ABC and I am thrilled to be joining the executive team at Screen NSW to again bring innovative, risk taking and unique stories to Australian screens.”
Roger Monk
Development Producer for Essential Media (QLD)
Roger is an award-winning screen entertainment writer who heads up Essential Media’s Brisbane office. Roger won the Australian Film Institute, Independent Film and Critics Circle awards for best script for the feature film Walking On Water (2002). It also won the Teddy award and Siegessaule prize at the 2002 Berlin Film Festival and special mention at BIFF.
More recently Roger wrote episodes for the multi award-winning and Emmy nominated Nowhere Boys. His pilot episode was nominated for an AWGIE Award. Roger was a writer on The Doctor Blake Mysteries S3 and co-creator and writer of East of Everything. Other TV credits include: Dance Academy and The Secret Life of Us. His script for the series Love Bytes (Fox Aust & UK Shine) was nominated for a QLD Premiers Award.
Roger will facilitate a panel discussion on the Future of Australian Drama.
