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Cate Blanchett TV series heads list of projects to share in $640,000 Screen Australia funding

Screen AustraliaA TV series developed and directed by actress Cate Blanchett is among 23 new TV and film projects to receive funding from Screen Australia, it has been announced.

Stateless, which marks Blanchett’s first venture into “high end” TV, follows the true story of German/Australian woman Cornelia Rau who, in 2004, escaped a cult only to end up in the notorious Baxter Immigration Detention Centre.

The list of funded projects, that will share in $640,000 of development funding from Screen Australia, also includes an Aboriginal-inspired zombie thriller called Cargo, and what has been described as a “larrikin-style” yarn, Digger, the work of creative duo Alexandra Blue and Dave Wade.

The team behind ABC comedy, The Moodys will also get development funding for Death is for the Living, a comedy drama directed and produced by Trent O’Donnell and Jason Burrows of Jungleboys.

Burrows is also involved in the comedy The Murderous Urges of Ordinary Women, while Nicholas Boshier from the Bondi Hipsters’ is one of the writers and producers of  another comedy, ET & Me.

Meanwhile, actors Bryan Brown and Rachel Ward will collaborate on a film version of Randolph Stow’s post apocalyptic novel Tourmaline.

Other drama projects to receive funding are The Devil’s Feather, which tells the story of a war correspondent, Kim Mordaunt’s Pink Mist which follows an Australian mission to Angola and The Fabulist, a production written by Adam Gyngell which was inspired by a true story of a con artist.

The siege at Sydney’s Lindt cafe is the basis of Does My Head Look Big in This? in which two teenage Muslim girls are the subject of community hostility and reconsider their relationship to their religion.

Screen Australia senior development executive Nerida Moore said: “The titles we’ve announced reflect a really exciting slate of projects and associated talent.

“They’re very individual in approach and each will have its own unique creative journey ahead.”

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