A new initiative, Australian National Theatre Live, has been established to screen Australian theatre in cinemas around the country. Following the success of Britain's National Theatre Live, ANTL will begin in   April with screenings of the Griffin Theatre Company's Emerald City before taking Sydney Theatre Company's notorious and fabulous Wharf Revue to cinemas. The venture, run by RealPlayMedia's Grant Dodwell, Raj Sidhu and Peter Hiscock, has been almost four years in the making as the trio have worked to convince "stakeholders" of its sustainability, including finalising a deal with the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance's Actor's Equity branch. Some state theatre companies previously have explored cinema screenings of their productions, and Sydney Theatre Company screened The White Guard in regional cinemas in 2011, but Dodwell believes his venture should consolidate the sector "because we're miles ahead, have learned a great deal and will have the distribution". "I can understand theatre companies are there to produce plays, and this is not in their remit, and they're busy enough and understaffed and under-financed to not consider it," he says.  
Yet he acknowledges ANTL's growth "is going to take some time because we're creating a whole new market for Australian plays. Like anything new or innovative, it's going to take time." The venture is also self-funded at this stage as the program falls through the cracks of funding from Screen Australia or the Australia Council. "But we fit into Malcolm (Turnbull)'s innovation funding!" Dodwell says with a laugh. After Lee Lewis's production of Emerald City starring Mitchell Butel, Lucy Bell and Ben Winspear, and the Wharf Revue, ANTL will screen Mary Rachel Brown's multi-award winning The Dapto Chaser and Geoffrey Atherden's Liberty Equality Fraternity later in the year. "There's no problem in getting plays now with all our paperwork in place," Dodwell says. "It's now about setting up our distribution."
The Australian Film Critics Association named its 2016 AFCA film award winners at a ceremony last night in Sydney. Mad Max: Fury Road scooped the awards, being named as best film (against Holding the Man, Last Cab to Darwin, Partisan and The Dressmaker), best director for George Miller and best cinematography for John Seale. Ryan Corr, who is now dominating the Sydney Theatre Company production of Tom Stoppard's Arcadia, was named best actor for his performance in Holding the Man, and The Dressmaker's Kate Winslet, Hugo Weaving and Judy Davis won the other awards, as they did the AACTA Awards. The Dressmaker's Jocelyn Moorhouse and PJ Hogan won the screenplay award. In the international categories, Christian Petzold's German thriller Phoenix was named best foreign language film, Academy Award winner Birdman won best international (English language) film and Asif Kapadia's Amy was named best documentary.
It is early days, obviously, but the Australian box office is already ahead of last year's record haul after the latest Marvel adaptation, Deadpool, surprised all to record the eighth best opening weekend in Australian cinemas. The action film starring Ryan Reynolds as a reckless superhero opened with $14.9 million and a screen average of more than $37,000 a screen across 396 screens. Compare that with the opening weekend for Star Wars: The Force Awakens when it averaged $28,964 on 941 screens last year. It is the biggest opening weekend for its distributor, 20th Century Fox Australia; the biggest opening for an MA15+ film; and the second biggest for a Marvel film behind Avengers: Age of Ultron, which opened with $15.7m last year. All other new releases paled in comparison, with Zoolander 2 earning $2.7m (for $4m in total after previews), while Academy Award best picture nominee Brooklyn opened with a strong $1.044m. Screenings of the launch of Kanye West's new album, Waves, earned $54,913 from seven screens.
Rising Australian star Bella Heathcote, who stars in next week's release Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, has joined the cast of the Fifty Shades of Grey sequel, Fifty Shades Darker. The film follows the exploits of Anastasia (Dakota Johnson) after she breaks up with Christian. Kim Basinger also has joined the film, to be directed by the director of Who's That Girl? and House of Cards, James Foley.
Geoffrey Rush began filming Stanley Tucci's Final Portrait, about artist Alberto Giacometti, in London this week. It is adapted from James Lord's memoir, A Giacometti Portrait. Rush stars opposite Armie Hammer, Tony Shalhoub, Sylvie Testud and Clemence Poesy.