The world of film and TV is changing rapidly. Screen Australia CEO Graeme Mason explains how the funding body keeps up.

• Screen Australia CEO Graeme Mason spoke to Business Insider Australia about the funding body's strategy in a content game which is rapidly changing.

• Mason says the two key questions are: "what do people want to make?" and "what do people want to watch?"

• "It goes back to our initial premise: we are meant to be making sure Australians get to see Australian content, and that Australian content creators get to make it," he said.

• Visit Business Insider Australia's homepage for more stories.

No matter which way you spin it, 2019 was a great year for Australian content on screens large and small.

As the media world moves into the next decade, one thing is increasingly obvious: consumers, especially younger ones, simply aren't getting their content the way they used to. Screen Australia, which has its roots in multiple government departments established for the purpose of encouraging Australian film production, has had to adapt to the dizzying array of new platforms through which Australians now get their content.

Screen Australia is the key funding body for the film and TV industry in Australia. If something was filmed in this country, Screen Australia has almost certainly touched it at some point – either through direct funding or the application of the government's production tax credit, which it also manages.

Screen Australia put out a report at the end of January celebrating the industry's wins – pointing to strong performance across film, TV, and new content platforms.

“The Australian screen industry performed solidly in 2019, with creators not only producing works that resonated with audiences, but with the sector remaining incredibly resilient despite the upending of entertainment business models globally,” Graeme Mason, CEO of Screen Australia, said in the Year in Review report.

“In part that is due to the bedrock of direct and indirect government funding that ensures Australian stories are told, but the bottom line is a film or series needs to be quality to attract the kind of solid viewership we’re seeing."

Speaking to Business Insider Australia, Mason said that regardless of the platform, Screen Australia's mission and strategy remains consistent. "We're here to help Australian storytellers make stuff," he said.

"So what we need to do is take a helicopter view of the sector as a whole. So, we still love helping make cinema that is experienced in a darkened room with people you don't know, with amazing sound and image – that's great.

"We love helping stuff get into people's living room – using old parlance – and help make great drama and documentaries that are on the telly."

But the other "lane", which is growing in importance, Mason says, is making content for people who consume content through those two vectors less and less. Yes, that does mean streaming services like Stan and Netflix, but it also refers to digital platforms and nontraditional content like YouTube, Snapchat, and Quibi.

The film industry in Australia has come a long way since the 80s and 90s, with content pushing into new platforms and content areas. Take "Meta Runner", a 3D animated series on YouTube set in a futuristic world where society is based around esports and video games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmhAp0SNUVM

"Meta Runner" ended up as the top-performing piece of Screen Australia-backed online content by a wide margin, racking up nearly 10 million views across the series. It, and content like it, is certainly quite a distance from the stuffy Australian period pieces you might have expected to see receiving government funding decades ago.

"It goes back to our initial premise: we are meant to be making sure Australians get to see Australian content, and that Australian content creators get to make it," Mason said.

The way Screen Australia thinks about this strategically is by being largely agnostic about how content is delivered, Mason says.

"The two questions are: 'what do people want to make?' and 'what do people want to watch'," he said. "The less obsessed we are about the platform, the better."

But the new media landscape brings challenges, too

Though diverse new content and streaming platforms provide benefits for both creators and consumers, they do create a problem for Screen Australia: the data.

"It is a challenge for us," Mason said. "With cinemas, you get the box office report that comes out that everyone can look at. Traditional telly we had the overnights, we know how many ratings it had, we know how many people watched it, and so on."

"With those other platforms, it's a bit more of a stretch."

The complexity there is that services like Netflix and Stan are usually reticent to share concrete viewership numbers outside of scattered press releases, which makes it more difficult to get a sense for how content has performed. And, as Screen Australia's report highlights, viewership is an important means of evaluating the performance of the investment.

However, Mason says streaming platforms are getting better and more transparent with what they share, and Screen Australia has other means of evaluating the success of content, like "Bloom" and "The Other Guy", two Stan shows it backed.

"Do I have actual numbers I can share? No," he said. "Do we have a fairly good idea on how these shows are travelling? Yes."

The business case for Aussie content

At the end of the day, it's all about the Benjamins.

Well, not entirely. But Mason acknowledges there is an economic value to Screen Australia productions which goes beyond simply ensuring "we don't just watch American content".

"What we do is really important creatively, it's really important culturally, but it's also a big business," he said.

59 Australian films were released in 2019, earning $39.8 million at the box office. Two in particular stood out with local box office takings: "Ride Like A Girl" at $11.58 million, and "Top End Wedding" at $5.28 million.

“On the big screen, the market remains incredibly tough for indie films from all countries, so to have both 'Ride Like A Girl' and 'Top End Wedding' break out was a great result," Mason said.

But the economic boon from Screen Australia productions isn't just in the takings. Australian content, Mason says, is still the "number one soft diplomacy thing internationally".

"Everyone around the world knows who Hugh Jackman is. And they know he's Australian."