Screen Australia has announced the next step in Gender Matters, the five point, $5 million plan over three years to address the gender imbalance within the Australian screen industry. Working closely with the Gender Matters Taskforce, Screen Australia will launch two new funding programs as part of this initiative: Brilliant Careers and Brilliant Stories.

The Brilliant Careers program is open to open to companies, industry organisations and guilds for proposals of up to $250,000 that: generate sustainable careers in the screen industry for women; identify gaps in career development pathways for female creatives; and support slates of projects and businesses that connect content to audiences.

Brilliant Stories is for projects that satisfy the ‘Three Tick Test’ – ensuring that three out of four creative positions of producer, writer, director, and protagonist are female. Brilliant Stories will provide up to $100,000 for feature films; up to $50,000 for teams to develop an inventive concept into a scripted television series of any genre or budget size; and up to $50,000 for scripted online and interactive projects.

Screen Australia had launched the Gender Matters initiative in December 2015, aiming to ensure that Screen Australia production funding is targeted to creative teams (writer, producer, director and protagonist) that are at least 50% female by 2018 year end.