The National Screenwriter’s Conference and Freedom of Speech

The National Screenwriter’s Conference and Freedom of Speech

The National Screenwriter’s Conference begins today on Phillip Island. I am a screenwriter, keen to catch up with fellow filmmakers to celebrate our art; our craft. I am also an occasional journalist and a blogger and this, I discovered, is a problem!

“All journalists, commentators, and media seeking access to conference speakers,” the email from the National Screenwriter’s Conference informed me, “have been advised that they will need to put in a formal request to the PR agency managing the conference. Accordingly if you intend to report on the conference and/or quote speakers please make contact with Catherine Lavelle Public Relations.”

It had not occurred to me that I might write about the Conference until I was informed by email that “By confirming your attendance as a screenwriter and not applying for access to the conference as a journalist or media representative you are agreeing not to report on the conference and/or quote speakers…”

“I will be attending the Conference as a screenwriter, “ I replied, “but cannot and will not agree that I will not write about it if I think there is something worth writing about.”

I wrote to Catherine Lavelle’s, the Conference’s PR representative. “The Screenwriter’s Conference has suggested that I should register with you. I am not sure why as I am not going to the conference with the intention of writing anything. However, nor do I wish to be told that I cannot write something if I feel that there is something worth writing about. Any clarification about why it is necessary to register with your public relations agency in order to be free to comment on the conference, if I so choose, would be appreciated.”

Catherine wrote back to me. “You are of course free to comment on the conference, however interviews and quotes for press from speakers need to be cleared with their agents, which is is why the event management team refer all media introductions and enquiries to us to facilitate. To that end we will add your email to our media alert distribution list and ask that if you are wanting to report on the conference including quotes and/or interviews with any of the speakers that a request is sent to us to shepherd through the approvals process prior.”

“I have no desire to conduct an interview with any speakers,” I replied. “However, if any speaker says something in a public forum that I find interesting, instructive, controversial, of course I will quote them - if, that is, I write anything. At present I am not planning to - unless, perhaps, about the absurdity of a public relations company having to "shepherd (me) through the approvals process" in order to quote a speaker.  And if a speaker/agent does not give approval to be quoted on what s/he said in public, what then? I do not believe that I need to request the approval of either the speaker or their agent to quote what is said in a public forum.”

Two days before the Conference was due to begin I wrote:

“I had hoped that at some point today I would receive from the Conference organizers an email along the lines of, “Dear James, there has been a misunderstanding. Of course, as a writer, you are free to comment, to express an opinion, to report on the Conference…”

The response to this was no response. My response to this non response was:

“I think it best, under the circumstances, that you cancel my registration, return my money to me and sell my place at the Conference to a screenwriter who has no objection to agreeing not to comment on his or her experience of it.”

My offer was accepted.  My registration fees have been returned to me and I am not going to the Conference.

I am curious to know if other screenwriters, indeed writers of any kind (journalists,   bloggers, Facebook commentators included) think it odd, to say the least, that the National Screenwriters Conference should place such restrictions on them if they choose to comment in print?

Screen Australia ban prevents Australian filmmaker from practicing his craft in Australia!

Richard Harris

Head of Business & Audience

Screen Australia

Level 7, 45 Jones St

Ultimo 2007     

                                                                                              

1^st March 2016

Dear Richard

You have not had the professional courtesy to acknowledge receipt of my letter of 22^nd Jan, let alone respond to it!

In so doing (or in not doing so!) you confirm that the fatwa put in place by Ruth Harley and the Screen Australia board close to four years ago now is still in full force. No one within the organization is allowed communicate with me by mail, by email or on the telephone.

As you know it is not possible for me to make a feature film, documentary or TV series in Australia without communicating with Screen Australia:

“To qualify for the Offset, a project must be assessed and certified by Screen Australia.

If I cannot meet with, talk with, yourself or anyone else at Screen Australia, if I cannot have any project of mine assessed I cannot, by definition, qualify for the Offset.

Of course this was the purpose of Ruth Harley’s ban – to make it impossible for me to make films in Australia. I learnt this the hard way when, a few years ago, I had to forego a pre-sale offer from National Geographic because I could not communicate with Screen Australia.

And why has this draconian ban been put in place? Because, it is alleged I intimidated and placed at risk members of Screen Australia’s staff with my correspondence!

You know this to be nonsense, Richard. Members of the Screen Australia Board know this to be nonsense. Anyone who looked at the correspondence would come to the same conclusion: “The allegation is nonsense.”

As with the Emperor’s New Clothes, however, almost everyone has a vested interest in not looking at the correspondence and having to say “There is nothing here!”

So let me ask you, Richard, as a former President of the Australian Director’s Guild (of which I was a founding member, representing filmmakers such as myself), to provide me with one example from my correspondence, since the inception of Screen Australia, in which I have intimidated or placed anyone at risk in any form of correspondence.

This is not a rhetorical question, Richard. You are now an integral and quite important member of the team that has declared that I cannot make films in Australia. Provide me with the evidence that I am guilty as charged. Just one example will suffice. 

cheers

James Ricketson

cc Commonwealth Ombudsman

Senator Mitch Fifield

The dangers of communicating with a banned filmmaker!

My latest failed attempt to get someone within Screen Australia to communicate with me. 

No, the Screen Australia board has decreed that my correspondence with SA staff was so intimidating, placing members of SA staff at such risk, that no communication with me can occur. 

Ever!

As for providing me with one example of the crime for which I have been banned, this would involve communicating with me – which has been forbidden!

Richard Harris

Head of Business & Audience

Screen Australia

Level 7, 45 Jones St

Ultimo 2007                                                                                                              

22^nd Jan 2016

Dear Richard

re NEXT OF VIPERS (aka ANGKOR)

Dear Richard

I am, as you know, a filmmaker banned by Screen Australia – ostensibly for having intimidated and placed at risk members of Screen Australia staff with my correspondence. This is nonsense. I have been asking for close to four years now to be provided with one instance in which I am guilty as charged. None has been forthcoming - for the simple reason that I have never sent such correspondence to any member of staff.

Graeme Mason refuses to communicate with me, as does Nerida Moore. This is in line with  the fatwa that dictates SA staff not even speak with me on the telephone. It may well be that you are obliged, as an employee of Screen Australia, to likewise ignore this letter and to consign the first 3 episodes of NEST OF VIPERS (enclosed) to the Screen Australia paper recycle bin. If so, so be it.

As an Australia filmmaker I would much prefer to mount VIPERS as an Australian co-production. This is not possible for as long as I am banned - a ban that must last the rest of my life as I have no intention of ceasing to be, when necessary, a critic of Screen Australia.

If you are prepared to ignore Screen Australia’s fatwa, please start to read Ep # 1 of NEST OF VIPERS. If it does not tickle your fancy, if you see no potential in it, no worries. If you want to keep turning pages and get to the end of Ep # 3, still keen to find out what happens next, have a look at the 2 page ‘concept’ I have included also.  

As you will discover, the two central leads – Nick and Stair – are Australians. They can just as easily be Americans, Canadians or British if VIPERS is to be an English language series. The female lead character of Angela, at present British, can  likewise be pretty much nay nationality without interfering with the narrative. Balin Meas (who will turn out to be a major character) is at present Khmer/American but could just as easily be Khmer/French if VIPERS were to be a co-French/Australian co-production. The character of Francoise, (also a major character) will remain French regardless and will, I think (or hope) attract a major French star to play the role.

It is hard to believe, in 2016, that Screen Australia bans filmmakers! The original ban was the act of petty and vindictive individuals who believed that critics of SA should be silenced. Such a mind-set should not be manifested in the upper echelons of Screen Australia and its Board.

Other than a sentimental attachment to the country of my birth and to the ‘industry’ I have been a part of for more than 40 years, it is no skin off my nose if NEST OF VIPERS becomes a non-Australian production.

best wishes

James Ricketson