Rachel Perkins | |
|---|---|
 Perkins at the 2012AACTA Awards in Sydney | |
| Born | 1970 (age 54–55) Canberra,Australian Capital Territory, Australia |
| Occupation(s) | Producer, director, writer |
| Years active | 1998–present |
| Spouse | Richard McGrath (divorced) |
| Children | 1 |
| Father | Charles Perkins |
| Relatives | Hetty Perkins (grandmother) Hetti Perkins (sister) Madeleine Madden (niece) |
Rachel Perkins (born 1970) is anIndigenous Australian film and television director, producer, and screenwriter. She founded and was co-director of the independent film production companyBlackfella Films from 1992 until 2022. Perkins and the company were responsible for producingFirst Australians (2008), an award-winning documentary series that remains the highest-selling educational title in Australia, and which Perkins regards as her most important work. She directed the filmsRadiance (1998),One Night the Moon (2001),Bran Nue Dae (2009), the courtroom drama telemovieMabo (2012), andJasper Jones (2017). The acclaimed television drama seriesRedfern Now was made by Blackfella Films, and Perkins directed two episodes as well as the feature-length conclusion to the series,Promise Me (2015).
Perkins is anArrernte andKalkadoon woman fromCentral Australia, who was raised inCanberra. She is the daughter of Aboriginal activistCharles Perkins and his wife Eileen.
Perkins was born inCanberra,Australian Capital Territory,[1][2] in 1970.[3] She is the daughter ofCharlie Perkins,[1] granddaughter ofHetty Perkins, and hasArrernte,Kalkadoon,[4]Irish, andGerman ancestry.[5] Her siblings are Adam andHetti Perkins, an art curator, and her niece is actressMadeleine Madden.[6][7]
She and her sister attendedMelrose High School in Canberra.[8]
Perkins' paternal grandmother's people were fromAlice Springs, and she wanted to learn more about that side of the family's culture, so, after finishing school in 1988, she applied for a job as a television presenter with theCentral Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA), mainly to get the airfare to fly there. As she expected, she was not given the job, but they offered her a traineeship atImparja Television, where she learnt the basics of production, includingediting and sound recording.[9][4]
After starting her career as a filmmaker, in the early 1990s she won a scholarship to study production at theAustralian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS) inSydney, where she met and collaborated withWarwick Thornton.[10] She completed the Specialist Extension Course Certificate – Producing in 1995, and also met and became friends withIvan Sen there.[11]
A few years after beginning her traineeship at CAAMA, aged 21, Perkins became executive producer of the Indigenous unit atSBS Television, the only person in the unit.[9]
In 1992, Perkins foundedBlackfella Films,[2] adocumentary andnarrative production company creating distinctive Australian content for television,live theatre, and online platforms, with a particular focus onIndigenous Australian stories. Much of her film work was done under the company name.[12]
Perkins wrote, directed, and co-produced (withNed Lander) a 55-minute documentary film about her father's 1965 protest bus journey into regionalNew South Wales, dubbed the "Freedom Ride". The film was calledFreedom Ride,[13] and it was part of the 1993 seriesBlood Brothers, which profiled four prominent Aboriginal men.[14] Perkins said that she travelled with her father to many of the places that the Freedom Ride visited, and it was also a good opportunity to interviewer her father about his early life and get an insight into him and events that she would not otherwise have had access to. She also gained an "understanding of the importance of filmmaking, in terms of capturing Australian cultural history".[9]
In 1996, under the auspices of the Indigenous Branch of theAustralian Film Commission, Perkins produced a film forWarwick Thornton (who was also a friend),From Sand to Celluloid – Payback.[9][15][a]
Radiance (1998) was her first feature fiction film as a director. She said later that it took a long time to cast the main characters, who includedTrisha Morton-Thomas,Rachael Maza, andDeb Mailman, then a newcomer fromBrisbane, and that they rehearsed for six weeks.[9]
In 2001 she co-wrote (with playwrightJohn Romeril[18]) and directed thetelemovieOne Night the Moon, featuring musiciansPaul Kelly,Kev Carmody, and Maireed Hannah.[9]
First Australians was a seven-part documentary series broadcast onSBS Television in 2008. The general manager of SBS Nigel Milan had askedGordon Briscoe what he could do for Indigenous people, and Briscoe suggested giving them back their history. It was a very ambitious project, and Perkins said that it was the most important thing she would ever work on, "because it really was an opportunity to try and tell the Indigenous story in a comprehensive manner from an Indigenous perspective, over a span of 200 years. It had never been done before".[9] The series took six years to make,[15] and as of 2024[update] remains the highest-selling educational title in Australia.[19]
Bran Nue Dae, a film version ofJimmy Chi's 1990s hit stage musical, was directed by Perkins and released in 2009.[15]
In 2009 Perkins was curator of theMessage Sticks Indigenous Film Festival. This tenth anniversary of the festival held at theSydney Opera House featured the premiere ofFire Talker, a documentary film about her father Charlie Perkins by Australian filmmakerIvan Sen.[20][21]
Her courtroom drama /biopic telemovie about land rights campaignerEddie Koiki Mabo,Mabo, featuringJimi Bani andDeborah Mailman, was broadcast in 2012.[15]
Also in 2012 Perkins directed two episodes of the first series ofRedfern Now in 2012: "Stand Up" and "Pretty Boy Blue", the latter dealing with adeath-in-custody.[15] She also directed the feature-length conclusionRedfern Now: Promise Me (2015).[22] Luke Buckmaster ofThe Guardian gave the film 4 out of 5 stars, praising its "superb cast" and saying "the series concludes at the peak of its power".[23]
Perkins executive produced the first series ofFirst Contact (2014), areality television show which challenged the non-Indigenous participants of Indigenous Australians.[24]
Also in 2014, she finished making the documentary filmBlack Panther Woman for SBS. The film was nominated for the Documentary Australia Foundation Award for Australian Documentary at theSydney Film Festival.[25]
She directed the feature fiction filmJasper Jones, released in 2017.[26]
Perkins wrote, directed, presented, and produced the three-part documentary seriesThe Australian Wars which aired on SBS andNITV in September 2022. This series examines theAustralian frontier wars fought across the country when British settlers moved in.[27][19][28]
Perkins has said that of all the filmmaking jobs, she likesediting the best, as it is the most creative part. She also said that she feels a great sense of responsibility "to make films or to use media as a vehicle to tell my people's story and to create change".[9]
Perkins foundedBlackfella Films in 1992.[2]
Darren Dale joined the company in 2000, becoming co-director of the company. The award-winningFirst Australians, a seven-part documentary series broadcast onSBS Television in 2008, won many awards and was also sold overseas.Miranda Dear, formerly head of drama atABC Television, was a producer and head of drama at Blackfella from 2010 to 2020.[12] Other productions have included the television filmMabo, the TV seriesRedfern Now, and many more since.[29] In 2009, Blackfella Films was renting space fromBangarra Dance Theatre in offices overlookingSydney Harbour.[9]
In 2022, Perkins left Blackfella Films.[12]
Perkins served asCommissioner with theAustralian Film Commission from 2004 to 2008, and since 2009 has been on the board ofScreen Australia.[29] She has been a member of the boards of theNew South Wales Film and Television Office (now Screen NSW), theAustralian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS),National Indigenous Media Association, the Indigenous Screen Australia, and theAustralian International Documentary Conference. She has said that she gets onto these boards in order to help drive government policy.[9]
In 2015, she raised funding for the Arrernte Women's Project, which had been established in 2014, one of the goals of which was to record the traditional songs and associated cultural knowledge of theArrernte women ofCentral Australia, to create an archive for future generations.[25][30]
Perkins became president of theAIATSIS Foundation in 2015.[31][32] She was a council member from 17 May 2017 to 16 May 2021,[33] and is deputy chair of AIATSIS board from 1 July 2024 30 September 2024.[34]
In 2019, she was invited to give theABC's annualBoyer Lecture, which she titledThe End of Silence, and broadcast onABC RN in November and available as apodcast.[5]
Perkins served two terms on theAustralian Heritage Council, from February 2015 to February 2018 and from March 2018 to March 2021.[35]
In 2023, she campaigned for a "yes" vote in the2023 Australian referendum to establish anIndigenous Voice to Parliament.[36]
In March 2024, Perkins was a guest speaker in a "spotlight session" at theAustralian International Documentary Conference.[19] In the same month, she was appointed chair of AFTRS, the first Indigenous filmmaker to be appointed to the position in its 50-year history.[10]
In 2024 she conducts masterclasses for Indigenous screen students at the Centre of Appropriate Technology inAlice Springs.[10]
Some of the many awards for which her films and TV productions have been nominated or won include:
Perkins has a son with her ex-husband, filmmaker Richard McGrath.[26][47]
She has said that next to filmmaking, music is her other passion.[9]
As of March 2024[update] she lives in Alice Springs.[10]
Sisters Rachel Perkins, 44, and Hetti Perkins, 49, are the daughters of renowned Aboriginal activist Charlie Perkins.
...an edited extract from the first of Rachel Perkins's Boyer Lectures. Her complete series of lectures, titledThe End of Silence, will be broadcast onABC RN.
...is awarded for outstanding creative enterprise within the film and television industries. The Award is given to an individual or organization whose work embodies the qualities of [producer]Byron Kennedy: innovation, vision and the relentless pursuit of excellence
...covers the Tudawali Film and Video Award. Rachel Perkins' entry 'Freedom Ride' won the award and Rachel discusses the film and using the visual media as a tool to help tell Indigenous stories
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