Meet the director & producer of One Thousand Ropes!

DEGNZ and Rialto will be hosting a special Film Talk for One Thousand Ropes on the day of its release. Join us for the film, followed by a Q&A with director Tusi Tamasese and producer Catherine Fitzgerald as they chat to Chris Dudman. Book your tickets here, only $12 for industry members. 

One Thousand Ropes is a powerful character drama of a father reconnecting with his youngest daughter and together putting to rest the ghosts that haunt them.

She arrives vulnerable: badly beaten and heavily pregnant. He struggles on one hand, with the inner temptation and the encouragement from the men in his life to take revenge in the way he knows best,  and on the other, to build the new family and companionship so desperately missing from his life.

One Thousand Ropes is a deeply moving film about connections, redemption and new beginnings. 

When: Thursday 23 March, 6pm

Where: Rialto Cinemas Newmarket, Auckland

Tickets: Rialto

Cost: $12 for industry members 

Last updated on 21 February 2018

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Register Now – Wellington Rehearsal Room with Tandi Wright

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Rehearsal Room with Tandi Wright

The Rehearsal Room with Tandi Wright – Wellington

The Rehearsal Room brings together professionals – actors and directors – in a safe, supportive environment to practise working with each other on scenes under the guidance of an experienced moderator.

“There was extremely practical and pertinent tuition from Tandi Wright…[The workshop] was incredibly useful and productive for me as a director, and for the project I am developing.”
– Past participant

Register on our event page to have your name in the draw to participate. For each event 4 directors and 8 actors will be selected. ONLY Actors Equity actors and DEGNZ directors are permitted entry to The Rehearsal Room. 

You need only register once. Your name will remain in the draw for future Rehearsal Rooms unless you ask us to remove it. If you are selected, we’ll email or phone you to confirm your participation.

When: Saturday 8 April 2017 9:30am – 1:30pm

Where: Te Aro, Wellington

Register at: Eventbrite

Registrations close: Wednesday 22 March

Cost: Free to DEGNZ members

 

Moderator – Tandi Wright

Tandi Wright is an actor of more than 20 years experience and has worked consistently across all the genres – film, television, stage and radio. She has worked in the US, Australia and NZ, and has been nominated for numerous theatre and screen awards in NZ.

Tandi has studied at Toi Whakaari, and at Shakespeare’s Globe in London. Theatre highlights include The Events, When The Rain Stops Falling, Three Days of Rain, Twelfth Night and A Midsummer Nights Dream. Screen highlights include The Returned, The Rehearsal, Jack the Giant Slayer, Out of the Blue, Black Sheep, Nothing Trivial, This Is Not My Life, Bliss, Serial Killers, Willy Nilly and Shortland Street. Tandi is one of the Vice-Presidents of Equity New Zealand. She considers her finest production to be the birth of her daughter Olive, who is now 8 years old.

 

Who is The Rehearsal Room for?

Professional actors and directors. It is open to Actors Equity and DEGNZ members of all levels of experience, from novices to virtuosos.

Material

Directors will be asked to provide a two-character scene (2 pages) or, if you prefer, a scene will be provided for you. Directors and actors will receive scripts in advance.

Structure of the event

Directors and actors will spend time rehearsing their scenes, with emphasis on connection and content.

After morning tea, participants will block their scenes, before presenting them for shooting, followed by viewing and discussion. The shooting is a wide shot only, intended as a means to review performance, not for directors to direct camera. 

The Rehearsal Room is hosted by Directors & Editors Guild of New Zealand and the Equity Foundation, with financial support from New Zealand Film Commission.

Last updated on 26 February 2018

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The Slap… Not Just An Aussie Drama Series

While the Australian screen industry is different from ours, there are sufficient similarities to warrant us keeping a close eye on what happens across the Tasman. The uproar that occurred when Freemantle Media hired a Canadian female director to direct an iconic Australian TV series, and later saying that there wasn’t a good enough Australian female director to do it brought into the open what many members of the Australian Directors Guild felt was the disdain that Australian production companies had for Australian TV drama directors. In Australia, this is directly reflected in the terms and conditions of employment of Australian directors and  forebodes for directors  here in New Zealand what Australian producers’  attitudes could be on Australian only or Aus – NZ copros shot here. We are all aware already how the NZ director’s position and the terms and conditions particularly have been eroded in the New Zealand screen industry over the last 15 years. I therefore felt it was important to put out Australian Directors Guild CEO Kingston Anderson’s entire op ed in their latest newsletter for your reading.

Op Ed from Australian Directors’ Guild
CEO, Kingston Anderson:

At the end of 2016 the ADG discovered the Fremantle Media was importing a Canadian director to direct the new television version of the iconic Australia story Picnic at Hanging Rock. The ADG was inundated with calls from members shocked at this move. There had not been an overseas director imported to direct a major Australian mini-series before and the fact that it was an iconic Australian story puzzled everyone. When challenged by the ADG about why this occurred the producers said they could not find a suitable candidate to direct the series. This slap in the face to such directors as Daina Reid, Rowan Woods and many other highly experienced and internationally produced directors was the final straw for many ADG members as it highlighted the disdain and disrespect many production companies had for Australian television drama directors.

But this is not a recent trend and it is highlighted by the ongoing battles the ADG has been having with producers and broadcasters over the retransmission rights that were  granted to directors in 2006. This was supposed to provide a director with a small royalty that would recognise their copyright in a film. However, the resulting opposition by producers to allow directors to claim this right has left a bad taste in many directors’ mouths, especially on productions that have gone on to be great hits and returned the producers both awards and money.

It also goes to the heart of the way director’s fees have stagnated over the past ten years leading to many leaving the industry or leaving the country. At the 2015 SPA Conference in Melbourne, the eminent TV producer John Edwards lamented the demise of long-form TV drama to increasing costs, except in one area – directing. The fact that he specifically mentioned that directors were the only ones who had not seen increasing fees speaks for itself.

It is these three things – Respect, Rights and Remuneration that are the heart of a campaign the ADG is running to highlight the situation TV drama directors find themselves in 2017. While Australian directors who work around the world are both respected and rewarded, many are disappointed at the attitude of Australian producers and production companies to their work. The lack of respect shown to Australian directors when choosing the set-up director for Picnic at Hanging Rock highlights a sea change in the attitude of producers. This attitude, to treat Australian directors as “just crew” has also seen occasions where the DOP on a television series has been paid more than the director.

As Paris Barclay, President of the Directors Guild of America (DGA) said on his recent visit to Australia to support local directors, “The director will shape a TV production in their own creative way. If you give the script to another director it will be a different production from another director.” This seems obvious to many but for producers their attitude to “cookie cutter” television belies this fact.

The advance of quality television around the world driven by the likes of HBO  has seen the movement of feature film directors to the small screen. This has occurred most notably in the United States but recent examples such as Rowan Woods and Tony Kravitz directing “The Kettering Incident” for Foxtel reflect a changing environment where the directors are asked to deliver more higher quality productions to attract that elusive audience. This importance of the TV director is recognised around the world and as such many of our most talented directors have left these shores – Kate Dennis, Michael Rymer, Jessica Hobbs, Daniel Nettheim to name a few. Most are directing in the UK or US where they are respected and paid well and where they receive royalties if their shows are successful.

The ADG is not calling for rates of pay that match their US or UK cousins, we want rates of pay that reflect the large increase in budgets. Those per episode budgets keep going up but the directors fee stays the same. We also see overseas productions being shot here using Australian directors alongside overseas directors, their rates of pay for doing the same job wildly different. A recent television production shot in Melbourne saw the overseas director getting paid more than three times the level of the Australian directors for doing the same work. If the show is successful, the overseas director will get rewarded in residuals but the Australians will not.

So what to do about this inequity?

The ADG is in negotiation with Screen Producers Australia (SPA) to address these issues in an historic agreement for directors. It will address these issues and hopefully with the co-operation of Australian producers we will be able to properly reward our talented TV directors and promote the respect they deserve for their high level creative work. Otherwise we will continue to lose the best and brightest which will inevitably lead to a reduction in quality on our TV screens. And in a world where competition for eyeballs is truly global, this will put the Australian television production industry at a disadvantage.

To illustrate this a producer at a recent SPA conference asked why he couldn’t get one of our directors back from the US to direct his new show.
My question was “Are you going to pay him the same as you always have?”
His answer was “Yes”.
My response was “Then why would he come back?”

Kingston Anderson
CEO
Australian Directors’ Guild
 & Australian Screen Directors Authorship Collection Society

Last updated on 21 February 2018

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Call for Applications: Directing Toolkit with Danny Mulheron – Wellington

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The Directors & Editors Guild of NZ invites you to apply for a 2-day Directing Toolkit Workshop with director Danny Mulheron.

The workshop will be held on Saturday and Sunday, 1 and 2 April in Wellington.

Danny will draw on his extensive experience to deliver an interactive and informative Directing Toolkit, which requires participants to get physically involved.

Day One topics will include:

  • The Director and the Script, Or: God I’m bored, why?
  • Text, Subtext and Context, Or: “Help, I’m struggling for depth?”
  • Observing Human Behaviour and Emotions, Or: On preferring what you don’t want…and recognising it.
  • The #1 Secret of the Actor/Director Relationship, Or: Don’t fall in love with them…too much?
  • Tools of the Director, Or: How to keep out of the way. It’s what you don’t do that counts.

Day Two will guide participants on working with actors, script reads, rehearsing, shooting and blocking through the use of demonstration and class exercises.

About Danny Mulheron 

Danny MulheronSince his graduation from the New Zealand Drama School in 1983, Danny has become an experienced director, writer and actor in all mediums – stage, screen and television. He is known as an ‘actor’s director’ due to his particular strength in directing actors and getting extraordinary performances.

Danny has directed award-winning television dramas, feature-length documentaries and smash hit theatre productions. His latest work has been Why does love?, a rock and roll movie about The Dance Exponents. Prior to that he directed all six episodes of the Hillary TV series for TVNZ. Other TV movies include The Kick, Rage and Eruption. Fresh Meat was a lesbian cannibal grind house movie for the Gibson Group which made it to the NYC Tribeca Film Festival.​ He is currently completing the writing of a screenplay based on the play The Motor Camp, as well as a couple of other screenplays in production.

 

What: Directing Toolkit Workshop with Danny Mulheron

When: Saturday 1 April,  9.30am – 4.30pm & Sunday 2 April, 9.30am – 4.30pm

Where: TBC, Wellington

Cost: Free for DEGNZ members, $100 for non-members

Lunch and refreshments provided.

A travel allowance is available for those coming from outside the Wellington region.

 

TO APPLY please send your application in ONE PDF to tema@deganz.co.nz with ‘Wellington Directing Toolkit’ in the subject line.

In your application, please provide:

  • CV
  • links to samples of your work
  • a maximum one-page letter stating why you want to attend this workshop. 
  • please also include your mobile number and any dietary requirements.

Extended Application Deadline: 9am, Monday 27 March.

This initiative is brought to you with the support of the New Zealand Film Commission.

Last updated on 14 August 2018

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Doing the Berlinale

I was extremely fortunate to be invited to the Berlin International Film Festival by the German Federal Government last month. I participated in an information tour of the Berlinale together with 25 other guests from around the world, made up of film festival programmers, journalists, and filmmakers from counties as diverse as Cuba, Israel, Tunisia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Australia, Pakistan and Kenya. It was a behind-the-scenes look at aspects of the festival, while at the same time getting the opportunity to experience it firsthand.

This was my first time at the Berlinale and it was a wonderfully soft entry to what is one of the four big festivals and markets for the film industry: Sundance (no market) in January, Berlin in February, Cannes in May, and Toronto in September, with the standalone American Film Market (AFM) bringing up the rear (and the dregs some would say) in November.

Berlin sells over 335,000 tickets to the approximately 400 films it shows. Around 20,000 professional visitors attend the European Film Market, Coproduction Market and Talents programme that make up the industry side of the festival.

As part of the tour we received briefings from the heads of the Panorama and Forum sections of the festival and the World Cinema Fund, and from the artistic director of the German Film Archive – Museum for Film and Television. We heard from four emerging German directors about their highly awarded projects, and received a lecture on New German Cinema. We had the opportunity to visit Berlin’s oldest film school—University of Film Konrad Wolf. We had a formal lunch with the Deputy Director-General for Culture and Communication and Director of Cultural Relations Policy of the Federal Foreign Office, where we each had to speak for our meal. And we joined about 500 other international industry people at the Goethe-Institut film breakfast, where they handed out their own film awards. And of course we could cue each morning with hundreds of others to try and get tickets to the films we wanted to see.

For those who don’t know, film festivals with markets fall into layers: the glamour with the film stars, the film festival with the movies and the punters, and the film market where the business is done. We got to see some of the glamour by attending the opening night, but it was essentially the festival and business sides from then on.

Three New Zealand films premiered at Berlin: DEGNZ member and director Tusi Tamasese’s One Thousand Ropes had it’s world premiere in the Panorama section, and opens in NZ this month. DEGNZ member and director Jackie Van Beek’s film Inland Road world premiered in the Generation 14 Plus section. And director Tearepa Kahi had the European premiere of Poi E, also in 14 Plus. All films received strong reviews.

Another DEGNZ member and director Niki Si’ulepa was the only Kiwi selected to attend Berlinale Talents, which invites 250 emerging international filmmakers to a series of workshops, panel disussions and events in a separate part of the festival.

New Zealand is thankfully a participant in the Berlinale NATIVe section that focuses on Indigenous film, run by expat Kiwi Maryanne Redpath who also heads Generation. NATIVe brings together indigenous filmmakers and organisations that gather around Berlinale and the world’s biggest indigenous film festival immagineNATIVE of Toronto. Libby Hakaraia and Tainui Stephen of the Maoriland Film Festival in Otaki have been driving Aotearoa NZ’s presence at the NATIVe stand, which this year according to imagineNATIVE’s Industry Director Daniel Northway Frank had good traffic through it.

In The Film Collaborative’s online blog American Jeffrey Murphy writing on this year’s festival said he revels in the glorious diversity of culture and languages at the Berlinale but that the festival lived up to it’s reputation of hit and miss programming, which was in his opinion due to the favouring of films “ from Eastern Europe and the like” rather than English or French titles.

In 2016 I attended three small film markets in Melbourne, New York and Prague, but the size of the European Film Market at Berlinale was huge in comparison. The EFM operates out of two official venues, Martin-Gropius-Bau and the Marriott Hotel, and you have to shuttle or walk between the two. There were hundreds of sales agents and a small number of film commissions (more like the old Film New Zealand than our NZFC) and funding bodies flogging their wares to distributors, producers and others across five days, while the Coproduction Market was held in another building where up to 35 projects were presented for coproduction and financing.

As is happening elsewhere, high-end TV drama and Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) is having an impact at the Berlinale. This year was the third that the festival has run a small market for high-end TV drama projects to find coproduction partners and financing. Cannes plans to dedicate an entire market to TV, over and above the two MIPs that already happen there.

The film industry globally is still in flux due to digital disruption. While transactional VOD and Subsciption VOD are starting to show real signs of revenue life, the old business model for film is essentially gone. Real revenues from theatrical exhibition go almost solely to tentpole films. If you are an indie, and all New Zealand films are, you’re exceptionally lucky (and or talented) if your film will survive four weeks in theatres, and there’s little after that to bolster revenue streams with DVD and blu-ray sales and rentals in decline. For an insight into revenues for Australian films, read this commercial analysis from Screen Australia.

One ray of hope from Berlin was that sales agents may be pre-buying again because they are having to compete with Amazon and Netflix for the best films. Hopefully this is a trend and it will grow.

Financials aside the Berlin International Film Festival is a true celebration of film, both critical and commercial, and an experience I won’t forget as a Berlinale newbie.

I’d like to thank the German Federal Government, the Goethe-Institut and the New Zealand Film Commission for their support of my visit.

 

Tui Ruwhiu
Executive Director

Last updated on 21 February 2018

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