Baz Luhrmann's Elvis and ABC TV's Mystery Road: Origin have dominated this year's Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) Awards, held on Wednesday at the Hordern Pavilion in Sydney.
Elvis, starring Austin Butler, took out the most accolades, with a total of 11 awards, including best film, best director, best lead actor, and best supporting actress, for Olivia DeJonge.
The movie applies Luhrmann's signature extravagant visual style to the life of The King, as seen through the lens of his former manager, Colonel Tom Parker (Tom Hanks).
Accepting the award for best director from London in the early hours of the morning, Luhrmann joked: "I have a couple of martinis lined up."
He also thanked his team, saying: "All of us held this movie in our hands like a precious child through COVID with one goal in our mind, and that goal was to bring audiences back into the theatre — old and young — and it is gratifying that we did it."
Mystery Road: Origin was the second most awarded production at the AACTAs, winning seven — including best drama series, best lead actor, for Mark Coles Smith, and best actress, for Tuuli Narkle.
The prequel series, about young Aboriginal detective Jay Swan returning to his hometown in remote Western Australia, follows the movies Mystery Road and Goldstone, and seasons one and two of ABC TV series Mystery Road.
Origin also led the TV winners at the AACTA Industry Awards on Monday, taking out best cinematography, best editing, best director, and best sound.
Accepting the award for best drama series, Mystery Road producer Greer Simpkin said: "COVID has been really hard for everyone … but we're a really brave industry.
"Australian stories define us as a nation; they change lives."
'The perception of glamour'
In his opening address for Wednesday's ceremony, Russell Crowe, president of AACTA, drew attention to the precarious conditions under which screen professionals work.
"The perception of glamour is merely a marketing tool that we take advantage of when it suits us. The reality of a creative life is workdays that never finish, crippling imposter syndrome, and the juggling act of trying to find a way to make your living in the gig economy," said Crowe.
"I heard [Oscar-winning designer] Catherine Martin recently describe a time she was plucking cat shit out of a sink in a dressing space planned for Nicole Kidman, moments before her arrival," he added.
The event also paid tribute to late figures from the Australian screen industry, including Uncle Jack Charles, Olivia Newton-John and Shane Warne.
Chris Hemsworth honoured
Thor actor Chris Hemsworth, who started his career on long-running soap Home and Away, received the AACTA Trailblazer Award for an inspirational screen practitioner, alongside video tributes by Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, George Miller and Taika Waititi.
Accepting the award, Hemsworth said: "I don't take for granted the start the Australian screen industry gave me. I'll do whatever I can to champion our incredible crews and creatives to the rest of the world and encourage big productions to head Down Under."
Last month, Hemsworth told Vanity Fair that he would be taking "time off" from acting after he discovered, while filming the National Geographic series Limitless, that he had inherited two copies of the ApoE4 gene and so is at a significantly higher risk of developing Alzhemier's disease.
"Doing an episode on death and facing your own mortality made me go, 'Oh God, I'm not ready to go yet,'" he said.
"It really triggered something in me to want to take some time off … I'm going to have a good chunk of time off and just simplify. Be with the kids, be with my wife."
Call for funding from Elvis designer
Costume, production and set designer Catherine Martin was also honoured, with the AACTA's Longford Lyell Award for lifetime achievement.
The award recognises her contribution to the Australian screen industry over the last 30 years — largely through her work with director Baz Luhrmann, her husband.
She also won best costume design and best production design (the latter with co-designers Karen Murphy and Beverley Dunn) for Elvis.
Presenting her with the award via a pre-recorded video, Nicole Kidman said Martin is a "visionary and a risk-taker and [has] created some of the most visually stunning imagery to ever appear on screen".
In her acceptance speech, Martin made an impassioned call for funding and support for educational institutions such as the National Institute of Dramatic Art.
"Government-funded institutions like NIDA, where Baz and I both studied, and federal and state funding for the arts, are the foundations on which today's vibrant arts and entertainment industries are built," Martin said.
"To us, institutions like Screen Australia are more than just funding. They carry the torch for bringing our stories to the world."
Martin has won four Oscars (more than any other Australian): for costume and production design for her work on Moulin Rouge! in 2002; and The Great Gatsby in 2014, with both films directed by Luhrmann.
She was also nominated for best production design for Romeo + Juliet in 1997, and best costume design for Australia in 2009 (also both directed by Luhrmann).
All of her and Luhrmann's films since Moulin Rouge have been made in Australia.
Backstage, Martin spoke to ABC Arts about the importance of big-budget films for training the next generation of talent.
"We have a responsibility to keep giving back in terms of skill-sharing. The more work we do, and the more works [filmed] here, at all different levels, the better we get at what we're doing," said Martin.
She also pointed to the importance of education — noting that she and Luhrmann were the beneficiaries of the Whitlam government's free tertiary education.
"When you have free education and it's accessible to more people, we as a culture become richer because the pool of likely candidates expands.
"Free education, funding for the arts and culture, that's part of being a healthy society, because [you're] telling your own stories."
ABC dominates
ABC TV won 15 television awards across the AACTA ceremonies on Monday and Wednesday, in addition to the awards for best documentary and best original score, for River, narrated by Willem Dafoe.
Besides sweeping the drama categories for Mystery Road: Origin, ABC also dominated the comedy categories, winning best comedy performer for Tom Gleeson, for Hard Quiz, and best comedy program, for the final season of Shaun Micallef's Mad as Hell.
Accepting his award, Gleeson thanked Aunty, and joked: "You can't rig this award so I must deserve this." referencing his successful, but controversial, campaign to win a Gold Logie.
"I think I might actually be genuinely humbled, thank you."
ABC TV also swept up best children's program, for Bluey, best documentary or factual program, for Miriam Margoyles: Australia Unmasked, and best lifestyle program, for Gardening Australia.
It's the fourth year running that Bluey has taken out its category.
- Watch Bluey on ABC iview
It's further recognition for the six-year-old blue heeler that last month floated above the streets of New York as part of the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade. Two of its stars, Dave McCormack (Bandit) and Melanie Zanetti (Chilli), were also guests on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, to celebrate the milestone.
The wins underscore the important position of the ABC in the Australian screen industry.
- Watch AACTA-nominated titles on ABC iview
According to Screen Australia's 2021/22 Drama Report, released last month, ABC invested $50 million in local drama production across 19 shows, up 12 per cent on last year. That's compared to the three commercial free-to-air broadcasters (Channels Seven, Nine and 10), which spent a combined $41 million in the same period.
While the 2022 October budget restored $83.7 million to the ABC, the Australian Directors' Guild, Screen Producers Australia, Australian Writers' Guild, and Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance's Make It Australian campaign continues to advocate for a significant boost in funding for ABC, SBS and Screen Australia.
Pathways for First Nations creatives
Mystery Road: Origin swept the major categories for acting, as well as best drama — a coup for First Nations storytelling.
Three of the four main acting categories were won by First Nations actors, including best lead actor, best lead actress, and best supporting actor, won by Thomas Weatherall for his role in Heartbreak High.
Speaking to ABC Arts, Mystery Road: Origin cinematographer Tyson Perkins talked about the importance of telling Australian stories from a First Nations lens.
"Mystery Road is all about Aboriginal ways of thinking, Aboriginal ways of seeing the world, and engaging non-Aboriginal audiences with that idea, and I think that is incredibly important," he said.
"There might be shows who feature Aboriginal actors or Aboriginal cast, but there are very few shows whose entire narratives are grounded in the ideas of offering the way that Aboriginal people see the world versus [how] non-Aboriginal people [see it]."
Leah Purcell won best lead actress in a film for The Drover's Wife the Legend of Molly Johnson, which also earned her nominations for best film, best director and best screenplay.
Accepting her award, she said: "I wanted to get this character right. I'm not only here to represent my mother, my grandmother, my great-grandmother, and all the aunties that have gone before me … I wanted to also represent the women of the land that had struggled and the hardships that come with that."
Talking to ABC Arts backstage, she spoke about the importance of creating pathways for emerging First Nations creatives.
"When I started out in this industry, it was always important to give back. I've always brought an army of young First Nations people with me, and mature people as well when they're breaking into the industry," she said.
Content quotas for streaming platforms
Netflix's Heartbreak High reboot scored the most AACTA awards of any streaming release, winning best screenplay, supporting actor and costume design.
Netflix also picked up awards for Thomas M. Wright's film The Stranger and Ronny Chieng's comedy special, Speakeasy.
However, it was the only streaming service to win at the AACTAs.
This relatively lacklustre performance draws attention to the current debate about the need for local content quotas for those services.
Australian and international streaming platforms are currently exempt from the local content quotas that govern public, free-to-air and subscription broadcasters.
That is expected to change with the release of the National Cultural Policy, due later this month.
In November, Arts Minister Tony Burke spoke at the AWGIE Awards about his intention to instate local content requirements.
He said: "[I told the streamers] we haven't settled on the design but be in no doubt, Australian content quotas, including for scripted dramas, are coming to this country."
The move is opposed by streaming services and local commercial broadcasters, who argue that quotas would increase already high production costs, and that the industry may not be able to cope with added demand.
Australian and overseas streaming services invested a total of $186 million in local drama production in 2021-22, across 24 shows, according to the Screen Australia report.
Heartbreak High actor Thomas Weatherall, speaking to ABC Arts backstage after his AACTA win, said he appreciates the efforts of streamers such as Netflix in telling Australian stories to international audiences.
"For me, having a character like Malakai, a young Indigenous man, in front of homes in America and Europe and [other countries], I think that's really important," he said.
"It's pretty surreal to be able to make a teen drama that has reached so many people, that's grown out of Australia and Australian actors and telling some stories that are innately Australian."
