General Diversity Round Update
General Diversity Round Update
A General Diversity Round was finalised prior to COVID...
General Diversity Round Update
A General Diversity Round was finalised prior to COVID-19, which saw five successful diverse, emerging screen practitioners provided the opportunity to develop their screenwriting and project development skills.
Screenwest connected each successful applicant with an experienced mentor to assist them with their skills development and develop pathways for their projects.
The successful General Diversity Round applicants and their mentors are:
- Carina Hoang / Aaron McCann and Warren Clarke
- Rachel Fitzgerald / Heather Wilson
- Nick McAllister / Miley Tunnecliffe
- Jessica Bailey / Miley Tunnecliffe
- Jay Emanuel / Zoe Pepper
Each practitioner has now commenced their mentorship, with some at various stages due to the COVID-19 restrictions.
“Screenwest were pleased to support the development of these practitioners through the General Diversity Round at this supports the WA Screen Industry Diversity and Inclusion Roadmap to develop our state’s storytellers and key creatives who identify as diverse. It also significantly supports their career progression within the industry,” explained Simone Flavelle, Diversity Manager at Screenwest.
She added, “We congratulate each of the practitioners and look forward to their contributions to diverse screen story and representation in Western Australian screen culture.”
For more information on each of the selected practitioners and their projects, read on!
General Diversity Round Funding Recipients
Carina Hoang
Carina Hoang is a leading advocate for the human rights of refugees and asylum seekers with a vision of creating fair and long-lasting policies that protect the people fleeing conflict and persecution.
Carina’s project will support her to be mentored by experienced Scriptwriter, Aaron McCann and Showrunner, Warren Clarke to develop her scriptwriting skills in order to transform her story into an episodic TV Series based on her book, Boat People.
Boat People is Carina’s remarkable story of escaping war-torn Vietnam and then returning, many years later to bring closure to those still searching for their loved ones.
Jessica Bailey
Jessica Bailey recently graduated from Murdoch University with a double major in Screen Production and Journalism. She has a passion for storytelling and grew up in Nigeria watching her favourite stars on screen, hoping that one day, she would become a part of it.
Jessica moved to Australia in 2012 with her Australian partner and looked at the Australian screen with no single representation of African Australian stories.
Jessica will be mentored by Miley Tunnecliffe as a screenwriter and director to develop her African Australian web series, The Family.
Jay Emanuel
Jay is a Perth-based storyteller with Indian heritage.
He is a writer, director and producer of theatre and screen media, as well as an actor and dancer.
In Oct 2016, Jay founded St Georges Dance and Theatre program and, more recently, performed in a company of sixteen actors playing four generations of family in the award-winning production, Counting and Cracking with Co-Curious and Belvoir Street Theatre.
Jay was recently the co-writer and co-performer in the development of Outliers with Sukhjit Kaur Khalsa, under the mentorship of creative producer Mala Sujan.
He has been supported to be mentored by Zoe Pepper to build on the Outliers skills development and learn how to write a web series exploring themes of home, identity, sexuality and cultural taboos in the South Asian community.
In 2019, he was shortlisted for WA Young Person of the Year award and Woodside Best Emerging Arts Award in 2016. He is a graduate of the two-year program at Ecole Jacques Lecoq.
Nick McAllister
From a very early age Nick always felt he was ‘different’ to other children. As the years went by, he continued to feel like the ‘odd one out’.
In 2017 Nick was finally diagnosed as being on the Autism Spectrum bringing him a huge sense of relief and belonging.
Nick is supported by Screenwest’s General Diversity Fund for Miley Tunnecliffe to support his skills development writing a web series, My Autistic Life. The series aims to show the truth of what living with Autism is really like; difficult, challenging, exhausting and sometimes painful. The series will also highlight the positive side to living with Autism and how Autistic people see the world through a unique perspective that is often beautifully different.
Rachel Fitzgerald
Rachel is an emerging writer/director who has completed a Bachelor of Screen Arts at Curtin University and Masters of Screen Studies at the WA Screen Academy.
She is an emerging screen practitioner who identifies as living with disability and who aims to, work her way to making a feature film by making short films and web-series.
The support from Screenwest’s General Diversity Fund will enable her to focus on developing her writing for web series skills through guidance from mentors Heather Wilson and Suzanne Ryan on her project, Hitmen.
Contact Screenwest
T: +61 8 6169 2100
E: info@screenwest.com.au
www.screenwest.com.au
www.filminwesternaustralia.com.au
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