Morris West

 The Illusionsiys 1955 radio drama - repeated in 1959

Books - Children of the Sun (1957), The Big Story (1957), The Second Victory (1957), The Devil's Advocate (1960), Daughter of Silence (1961)

June 1958 appeared on ABN-2 panel show Any Questions after over two years away

1960 appeared on ATN-7 show Talking Point. 

Daughter of Silence - review of play from 1962 here and here - played on Broadway in 1961

In 1963 he said the “ABC cannot pay Joan Sutherland or me the money we could get in New York, but it can at least give recognition.”  

Jan 1964 ABC presented ITV adaptation of Children of the Sun see here

 

SMH 30 March 1963

The Age 3 April 1963

SMH 3 April 1963

SMH 3 April 1963

SMH 17 July 1965

West had a lot to say at the Vincent Committee - see here or here.

Morris Langlo West, Author, sworn and examined. By the Chairman.
—You are acquainted with the terms of reference of the Committee?
—I am.
I take it you are aware that this is a public investigation?
—Yes.
If there is any aspect of your evidence that you feel should be given privately we will consider taking it in camera, but we prefer it ail to be public?
—I understand that.
Would you inform the Committee of your experience as a writer and dramatist?
—I am presently engaged in full-time authorship. Broadly that involves some television, some Broadway, some international drama and some film work. Previous to that I was engaged in the production of commercial radio programmes, syndicated recorded programmes in Australia for ten years. As a full-time author, I have published eleven books which have sold something like 6,000,000 to 7,000,000 copies. I have had two plays on Broadway. In one of them I was interested as writer, investor and assistant producer. 1 have had three of my books purchased for films. I served a period of four months in Hollywood as scriptwriter for a film studio. I have three companies which are interested in the distribution and merchandising of various rights in my literary properties. I am the director of a newly formed company in Sydney that has for its aim the production of feature films in Australia.
That is an impressive record. As a matter of interest, would you care to inform the Committee, in view of what I might describe as your outstanding success as a writer, why you prefer to write in Australia and not somewhere else?
—I was born an Australian, I wanted to remain an Australian, and I want my children to be brought up as Australians because I believe a national background is good for children. I have lived abroad a good deal and I have seen the problems raised for adults and children by being expatriates. As against that, I have to say that it would be more convenient for me financially and in other ways professionally to live abroad, but I choose to live here, principally for the sake of my children.
By the Chairman.The Committee has agreed to take as read Mr. West’s prepared submission, as follows
— Television programme production in Australia. For the purpose of this testimony I wish to limit myself to pro- grammes of a dramatic or documentary character since it is in these- fields I am most experienced. The following elements have to be defined and then considered in detail. 1. Production. The function of assembling and putting together all the elements of a finished programme. It includes such details as negotiating of fees, typing and duplicating, hire of costumes and rehearsal rooms, &c. &c. The man. who fulfils this function is the producer. The facilities at his disposal are called production facilities. We do have good production facilities in Australia. However they are not so expensive or comprehensive as those which exist in other countries. They could however be expanded quickly to meet demand. 2. Direction. The function of directing authors, artists, camera- men and technicians to give form and shape to the programme seen on the screen. The man who fulfils this function is the Director. We- have a very small number of good Directors in Australia. The best vary from middling good to middling bad. Dilection ss a creative function and the number of first grade Directors in the whole world is comparatively small. The best command fabulous sums of money. On the law of averages we cannot expect to produce too many in this class. Education and opportunity should give us a satisfactory number of good ones. In this case opportunity means properties to work on and money to finance them. The best Director in the world will not attempt to produce an t-px on a shoe siring. 3. Author. The author is the writer of the programme. In general it is his iunction to create the dramatic idea and follow it through cveiy stage of writing from the outline to the final shooting scripts. This dennition implies a double ability: To create a dramatic siory and then to translate it into the technical idiom of television. Some writers can create but not dramatise. Some writers can dramatise but not create. The most valuable writer is the man who can do both.

In Australia writing standards, both technical and creative vary a great deal. One of the grave mistakes of the industry in Australia has been Us practice of lumping all writers into one class so that the best refused to write for it and the worst set a standard of performance and payment for the rest. Writers too have made grave mistakes. A Writer is not an independent entity. A novelist needs a publisher. A dramatist needs a producer. A best selling novelist commands big money because his work makes big money for his publisher. A successful dramatist makes big money for himself because he makes big money for his producer. No amount of subsidy or feather-bedding will make a good writer out of a man whose work is unacceptable to the public on television. Too many writers have refused to inform themselves on the business side of their craft. They sign inequitable contracts. They fail to define the rights they sell. They fail to seek the simplest legal advice in their dealings. They accept ludicrously low fees, and then are forced, by economic pressure in a low grade per- formance. Managements who have sought to make profit from this situation have in the long run, done themselves a dis-service because show business is always risk business, and in the long haul, success or failure depends on the quality of the product. Australia is one of the few countries in the world where the royalty principle of payment is not applied to television works. If the royalty principle applies, a writer can accept a reasonable fee for the first performance of his work, and then stand, or fall for his later profit on its saleable quality in other markets.
Do we have enough good quality writers in Australia to sustain a large scale production of dramatic programmes?
1 am very doubt- ful if we have. As 1 shall show in the next section, a profitable production indus- try in Australia will have to depend largely on export markets. To write for these export markets requires a special experience in idiom, presentation, and programme content, which most Australian writers do not have. Only those who have gone abroad have had the opportunity to get it. If they have made any success abroad, they are not prepared to work under the conditions presently prevailing in the Australian Industry. 4. Performing talent. This term comprises all those who appear on the television screen. Singers, comperes, actors, musicians, &c.
Do we have enough Australian actors to sustain large scale pro- duction? Again, 1 doubt it. To compete in world markets, we would have to import star talent. This is not impossible, it may even be desirable, but we could not create an industry without it. This is not simply a matter of talent. It is a matter of export appeal. We have a better chance of getting a dramatic programme on U.S. television if the lead actor is at least known to that audience. Public entertainment is based on public psychology, and we cannot afford to ignore the fact. Our local talent has a local appeal. If we want to present it over- seas we shall have to begin by associating it with overseas talent. We have also to consider very seriously the problem of the Aus- tralian idiom and more importantly the Australian accent. To many people overseas our accent is a curiosity, and is sometimes a worry in a sustained dramatic role. . . . Even Sophia Loren had to learn international English before she became a success in U.S. pictures, and Cockney comedians who bring the house down in London are unintelligible in Brooklyn. 5. Merchandising. A television programme, good or bad, is a commodity. Its value depends on its circulation. Making programmes is an industry and an industry has to survive by making profits. If it doesn’t make profits, it goes bankrupt. The function of a programme industry in Australia is therefore to make programmes and then sell them to as many outlets as are necessary to make a profit. It is possible to make profitable low budget productions for local use. If we want to make high quality dramatic productions we shall have to depend for our profit on the export market. This will require on the one hand, a large capital outlay and on the other a suitable distribution organization in other countries of the world. It will also need a very careful selection of subjects so that we do not compete with more powerful and much better organized overseas producers on their own ground. If for example we make westerns in Australia we shall inevitably lose money, because they can be produced better, more cheaply, and in a more familiar idiom in the United States. I believe that the answer lies in selecting specialized subjects which are not available elsewhere, and then in raising part of the production capital from American or British sources, especially those sources that handle distribution, so that having a stake in the film they will also have the inducement to work actively to promote its distribution in their territories. This is the normal practice in the international film industry, and we shall have to conform to it if we want to develop and survive in programme making. It must be emphasised again that cap tal invested in the entertain- ment industry must be regarded as risk capital. It seems to me that the best kind of assistance that could be given by Government to this industry would be the provision of a special scale of rebates and of reduced tax rates to profits earned by the industry. I would not favour either direct subsidy or the imposition of quotas and tariffs on imported material. For my own part I stand firmly on a simple principle: the entertainer does not have to be an entertainer. He presents himself to the public at his own risk. If they throw cabbages at him it is because he has failed in what he set out to do. If they throw bank notes at him, it is because he has succeeded, and he is entitled to the full reward of the risk he has undertaken. By the Chairman.—Would you be good enough to glance at some of the provisions of the Broadcasting and Television Act? I wish to get some of your views on what are and what might be or should be the cultural or sociological aims of television, and in that context I would be grateful if you would look at section 16—(1.) (c), which reads— The functions of the Broadcasting Control Board are to ensure that adequate and comprehensive programmes are provided by commercial broadcasting stations and commercial television stations to serve the best interests of the general public. I might add that that is actually the only provision of the Act that relates to standards to be adopted by commercial television stations and administered by the Broadcasting Control Board. Could I invite your comment in the first place on whether you feel that the expression “ adequate and comprehensive programmes ” in this section would define adequately what you would subscribe to as being the aim of a television station?—I would have some doubts as to whether it defined the subject adequately. There are two aspects, 1 think; What is mandatory and what is desirable. What I would regard as a lay-man as being mandatory under that section of the Act would be the provision of programmes of news, of public service, of public entertainment, of charity, of religion and so on so that the diversity of the interests of the watching public would be covered in a general fashion. I would regard certain obligations as being implicit in the section, namely, that the station should be free, so far as possible, from partisan interest, that news should be delivered free from slanted commentary, that entertainment should be free from a tendency to corrupt in the legal sense, but I would regard the inadequacy of the section as being that it does not and probably cannot define questions of taste and questions of public appeal. 1 think this is probably a good thing since in a permissive society the fewer mandates we have to function well and justly to one another the better. That is a personal opinion. Would you say, from your knowledge of commercial television, that their current programmes could be regarded as both adequate and comprehensive?—I should think in the legal sense, and I speak as not a legal man. they would be so regarded under the terms of the Act as fulfilling the obligation in the licence, but I am sure that they have defects and these defects could be explored. Could wc take some of them now? Could 1 invite your comment on some aspects of what can be considered as comprehensive in the field of programming? Could we take, first of all, the religious side of life? I believe that about 11 o’clock or 10-30 every night there is a religious programme called “ The Epilogue ”, which means, of course, that most children arc in bed and. according to the statistics, most people turn the television off at that stage. That is about the only direct religious telecast other than some programme on Sunday. Would you regard that as a comprehensive attempt to portray our established religion?—With respect. Mr. Chairman, I think there is a problem which the television stations have in this regard. We are a plural society. Wc have many religions. We have one established religion tinder the Crown. I would submit that this may be a difficult area to be precise in because the stations themselves cannot originate specifically sectional religious programmes without offering the same time and the same facilities to peoples of all faiths
understand from the little I know of religious programming that the procedure is to offer a limited amount of time—- not peak time—to religious bodies for sponsorship. I know a little about the making of religious programmes from the B.B.C. and also from radio practice here and I think that where such sponsored programmes fall down is in the content provided by the people who sponsor them. I do not think the television stations tend to exercise any direct censorship or control or slanting of the programmes, and I think in this they may be regarded as reasonably guiltless, if not greatly meritorious. Would you go so far as to agree with me if I were to say that some of the blame here might not lie with the television stations at all but with the churches?—I think that is a reasonable statement. Perhaps I might be right in suggesting to you that in Australia the churches are not yet aware of the import- ance that television has in sending out a message in terms of religion?—I can speak only for my own church. I think my church is not sufficiently aware of the potentialities of the medium.
By Senator McClelland.—Would cost considerations come into it with these organizations?
—Cost factors do operate with religious organizations. Diocesan bodies allot a certain amount of money for television production and this is rather small in view of the costs involved.
By the Chairman—l want to get you back to this definition because we are concerned with what I might call the philosophy of this. Let us take the expression “ comprehensive programmes Would you care to express an opinion on whether any commercial people are giving enough emphasis to programmes of better quality, in view of this definition?
—I think one would have to distinguish between the various types of programme. Let us take drama, for a start?
—I think the problem that the television stations have at the moment is that they are televising what they can get.
For a price?
—For a price. I could not say that there was discrimination on the part of television stations against quality as quality. They are buying in world markets and they have to take what is offering to them in the world market. The yardstick by which the commercial stations at least judge is the yardstick of circulation—the yardstick of audience appeal. The A.B.C. is in a some- what different case, because it works to a more rigid charter or commission. It is limited by its commission and is forced more than are the commercial stations to have more regard to the minority groups in the com- munity. In other words, if I am a rose grower, I have some reasonable rights for my licence fee, for somewhere in the year the A.B.C. will provide a programme about roses, even if it is only a ten minute one. In the main, I think they try to do this. The commercial stations have a double limitation. I have no brief for them, because I am not a shareholder. 1 simply want to get down to their problem. They are limited by the Broadcasting and Television Act and by a legal obligation to make profits for their shareholders—to operate in a business- like fashion to provide profits for their shareholders. In that, they come under the Companies Act. I think there is no doubt that they are operating to the benefit of their shareholders and so are not amenable to the Companies Act. I do not think we shall argue that?

—I know that they are leaning towards the single yardstick of circulation in their programmes. I think that possibly they are leaning too far, but they cannot be held wholly accountable for this, because the Broadcasting and Television Act provides that they shall be competitive one with another. I think that any discussion of what they are doing must keep clearly in mind the fact that by legislation they are made a competitive industry, and competition in the industry is, as it is in the newspaper industry, for circulation. It may be said that the wisest competition for circulation is on the MR. M. L. WEST basis of public service. But I think it is a matter of human experience that the safest competitive ground is that of entertainment. How far do we take this standard that you now suggest in terms of popular demand as against what might be described as common standards of good taste?
—I think that here we are coming into a ground of argument which calls in question the nature of the society we have and the nature of the society we want. If we wish to have a permissive, reasonably self-controlled society where legislation is reduced to a minimum, where mandate is reduced to a minimum and where checks and balances are allowed to operate within the community, I think we shall have some of the defects of the system. The other example is that of the Ministry of Culture which prescribes what is in good taste, what I need and what the man next door needs, and then proceeds to deliver it to me by mandate. I think that we are coming on this ground of argument on a rather deep philosophical question which may, if we are not careful, involve us all in certain anomalies. I personally, since I am being asked to express an opinion, lean as much as possible to the permissive self-adjusting method, with all its defects. 

I much appreciate your expression of opinion, too. I think you will agree with me that this aspect of what one might call the philosophy of television is not discussed very much?
—I feel that it should be aired. If I may be a little more specific at this moment about the defects of the system—the defects of programming—I feel that not enough attention is presently given to what is, in my belief, a certain amount of indirect censorship by both commercial stations and the A.B.C. of programmes of information and controversy. If we are to have an industry that reflects truly our democratic system, we must have room for infor- mative and controversial discussions. I do not think that we have enough forum programmes. By this I do not mean five or six people being dull on the air. But the air does not provide, as it does in America and England, for the clash of opinions on what is after all a greater and most import- ant organ of public communication. I believe that the same argument applies to our documentary programmes related to news. One of the great features of British and American television is the attention given to background news pro- grammes which are thoroughly researched so that the rest of the world is brought into focus for the country—pro- grammes like “ The Huntley Brinkley Report ” and like “ Panorama ” in England. I worked on “ Panorama ” for several months, and I had a degree of freedom which, frankly, does not exist in this country. I did a programme on the Dutch refugees in Indonesia—the half-bloods who were shipped out of Indonesia to Holland and who were taken up by the Dutch Government. I was put aboard a ship. I was given a free hand, a camera man, a director and a number of grips. I said, “ What limitations do I have in this programme? ” They said, “ Mr. West, you have no limitations. You report what you see. Whether you are right or wrong, we will back you.” 

By Senator Wright.-—By whom were you engaged for that?
—The B.B.C. I did a programme on the back streets of Naples—“ Children of the Sun ”—which raised a storm of protest from the Italian Government and the official Italian tourist agency. I myself was guilty of a lapse into anger on the programme on the public air. The B.B.C. took a very clear stand. It said, “ We investigated the facts that this man reported. We believe that they should be reported. We stand behind him in toto and will resist any attempt at interference either from the Foreign Office or from the foreign government.” I have some experience of controversy on the Australian air. While I cannot be specific in the legal sense, I am prepared to state on this privileged occasion that I was aware of a degree of censor- ship which was discomfiting and which I feel was dangerous. By
Senator McClelland.—By the A.B.C.?—
By the A.B.C. and by commercial stations.

By the Chairman.—How is the presence of that made evident to one? How is it done?—Let me give you an example. We had a programme called “ Any Questions? By Senator McClelland.—That was on the A.B.C.?— That was on the A.B.C. The questions were submitted first to a set of people who were to me anonymous on the A.B.C., and anything that might smack of controversy or politics or discomfiture was sedulously weeded out before we got there. I know, because I put in certain questions through other people and they were weeded out. So the thing became completely flaccid. By the Chairman.
—And very dull?
—Quite dull and also censored. Certain questions on commercial stations were sedulously kept out of discussion. I do not want you to name the person in the A.B.C. who would do this blue-pencilling, but you may be able to mention his office?—This is a very difficult one to pin down, because the programme, I believe, came under the Director of Talks. His authority would be delegated through a num- ber of people. So I would say that it would be true that a reasonably junior officer of the A.B.C. would be inter- preting what he believed to be the policy of the Director of Talks. In this case, you see, there is no recourse, be- cause how do you pin it down?
By Senator Wright.—You nominated your own ques- tions?
—Yes.
By Senator McClelland.—What do you say about the commercial side?
—I would say that on the commercial side the same thing operates. It operates in a number of different ways. I have heard and read in the evidence offered to this Committee of causes of friction between management and various industrial unions. I believe that some of these causes of friction which have created an atmosphere, shall we say, in the discussion are due to the interpretation of policy by junior officers who have been lacking in tact and real understanding of a situation, and that management then has to stand behind them. I have had some experience of my own in this regard—not im- portant occasions, because I simply walked away from them. But I think this is a problem. It is a problem in any big organization where management must continue to delegate. In questions of finance and in questions of pay- ment of artists and script writers, there has always been a tendency for the junior officer to be triumphant about saving somebody £5 where one has breached a principle. The management must stand behind him. I do not know whether I have gone far enough on that. By the Chairman.—You have. We were talking about defects and you were giving some interesting illustrations of how you feel information and talks programmes are affected. Will you apply your mind to other aspects of programming. You may or may not be familiar with the Pilkington Report on broadcasting in England. At page 51, that Report deals with standards, particularly with reference to drama. By “ drama ” I embrace all aspects of pro- gramming of a dramatic character. The report states— Last, and by no means least, since it is of overriding importance, those who handle so powerful a medium must be animated by a sense of its power to influence values and moral standards and of its capacity for enriching the lives of alt of us. The broadcasting authorities must care about public tastes and attitudes, in all their manifold variety, and must keep aware of them. They must also keep aware of their capacity to change and develop. They must in this sense give a lead. 

Do you subscribe to that view?

—The phrase has been very carefully worded. They say “ must be aware ” and “ keep aware ”. They do not say “ must legislate for ”. No, I am coming to that?—And I think this is important. I agree that every pressure other than unnecessary legisla- tive pressure—I say “ unnecessary ”, because when you come to matters of public morals and public interest another rule applies—I agree with every indirect pressure that can be brought to bear to raise standards in the industry. I am chary of committing myself to a definition of how much more should be made the subject of legislation, but 1 agree with the Report in that sense. Having got past the hurdle of standards, what is your view on the general standard of drama in the commercial field?—May I, as a prelude, range over the field of pro- gramming for a start? Yes?—Our reporting of news seems to be adequate and comprehensive. Our backgrounding of news by docu- mentary programmes, I believe, is dangerously inadequate. I believe that we are being cut off from a true knowledge of all the ambients in which we live—our far-eastern ambients—and our news of the world comes from other people and not generally through the eyes of Australians. Those programmes that have been made by Australians have tended to be superficial, unresearched, hastily pre- pared and under-financed. In the field of variety we have done reasonably well, although I believe dramatic stan- dards are very low. We have unearthed quite a lot of new talent and given it a chance to present itself on the air, but the general standard of treatment of presentation has been low. Part of this is due to the lack of first-rate directors. Part of it is time related to money. These programmes have had to be pushed on, on a relatively low budget. They are expensive to produce. They are on a quick time schedule and they have suffered in consequence. Our dramatic pro- grammes have been largely imports. Those that have been made have been experimental, in the sense that they have been sporadic, so they can only remain experimental. You do not train directors, cameramen, technicians, floor staff, lighting experts, dress designers, and set designers, unless you give them continuity of work. This they have not had. So our local drama, in spite of some quite bold experiment, has tended to be sporadic and not to fulfil a true function. I believe that our imported programmes vary greatly in content. We have extremely good ones, then run-of-the-mill programmes which, strangely, I do not denigrate. I do not think that personal taste is necessarily a determining factor. We have had too many westerns. At times we have had rashes of violence against w'hich the public has reacted quite sharply.
By Senator Hannan.—Do you like the odd western?
— Yes, I can sit down and watch a horse opera. This brings in the matter of taste. It might be argued that there are too many. Then the question is what do von put in their place. We have not produced enough to fill the space, and I do not think that you wipe out a defective article by replacing it with something worse. If we are to replace im- ported western and other programmes, we must replace them with something better. I do not think that we do the country or the industry a service by replacing it with some- thing simply labelled, for one reason or another, “ Aus- tralian ”. The technical and production standards of American programmes have been extremely high. Content has often been, at the worst, innocuous, empty, vapid. Content of the best British programmes has been extremely good. But strangely enough, and largelv, T think, as a result of the new wave of dramatists and the trial of “ I.adv Chatterley’s Lover ” we are seeing a certain amount of extremelv vulgar British comedy which—again, it is a personal opinion— offends good taste more than the average American comedy. This is a personal view. Let us sav that it goes closer to vulgarity than American comedy would be. allowed to go on the American air. That is a general conspectus. Can you relate what you have said to the all-important question of Australian-produced drama for television and give us your views as to how. in terms of reality, this can be looked at?
—We have to look at what we can do well in terms of quantity. I think it is idle to believe that we can with our present resources, wipe out ten, twenty, thirty, forty or fifty per cent, of imported drama and replace it with Australian drama. In my view, that is plainly MR. M. C. WEST  
impossible at this moment. It is impossible in terms of the production factors that we have at our disposal and it is impossible in terms of money. I think we must say that we can do a certain amount more but we must not expect it to be too much. Let us examine briefly the factors that go to make up a dramatic programme. First you have to have production facilities. These we have. I think it is clear to the Committee that the technical facilities of the industry are very, very adequate. There is really nothing we lack to make film or tape or programme, in terms of technical pro- duction facilities. They are not as extensive or as well organized in terms of overall reduction of costs as they are where the facilities are numerically stronger. In Hollywood, if you want a chariot you ring up, find that there are twenty and get the one that is cheapest. Here, we can get a Roman chariot made if we want it. We can get wigs made. We can get every conceivable installation. We have the facilities. There were three Cobb and Co. coaches for “ Whiplash ”? —Yes. I think we are w?eak in terms of direction, which is the function of directing actors and everybody else on the set to produce the finished programme. Top-line direction, is a creative art. Genuinely creative artists, as against routine workers, are comparatively few and command high prices. One of the problems of the Australian director is that he does not really have enough latitude in which to work. Latitude in this case means money. You say to a man. “ Put me on a half-hour children’s pro- gramme. You have a budget of £200.” I cannot give you accurate figures showing how much is used for lighting and for the sets. He has no time to work in. The actors have to be paid for the half-hour, plus half an hour of rehearsal. He is scratching to do anything in the time and with the money allotted. In the main, they do a reasonably good job, but there is no chance to improve oneself. Our little company will be faced in the next six months with going to England to find a director. The first thing you do is ask, “ What are your credits?” He has a list of them—such and such pictures. You say, “ Let us look at what the grosses were. How did the pictures do? ” If they were flops, you say, “ We must look for another director.” These men must have credits to show you. Unfortunately, our local boys do not have the opportunity to get these feature credits or the practice which they imply, so we have the problem of directorial talent. The next element, which has been raised from various aspects with this Committee, is the element of authorship. This needs very clear definition in the minds of the Committee. It. is not an over-statement to say that the writer in a dramatic programme is the beginning, and if he is not good he is also the end of it. I am, by all standards, a successful author, and yet I am not hired to write a screen play for “ Cleopatra ” and paid 500.000 dollars for it. The reason is perfectly clear. I have written film scripts and been extremely well paid for them, but I am primarily and in the international eye and in the international industry a novelist. There are many men who have had much more experience than I in the film field. Therefore, with an investment that is going to be 50.000,000 dollars, you say, “Who is the best man we can get, because on him our whole investment swings.” If the story and the script are no good, you might just as well tip your money down the chute. There are creative i writers who are story men. men who can tell stories, i There are technical writers, who could not tell a story to i save their lives, but who say, “ Give me that and I will put < it into a filmic idiom so you can put a camera up against « it and shoot it.” A combination of the two is the highest paid i writer. The mediocre story-teller, the mediocre technician, s is a dubious quantity. I would much rather have a good 1 technician, because you can buy a story from someone v else. It comes back to a question of quality and definition c in the. writer’s work. Much has been said before this \ Committee and in the press about the large number of V writers, we have in this country. Here again I would like s; to distinguish and define. As the thing stands at the d MR. M. L. WEST moment, anybody with an itch to write and put words down on paper can call himself a writer. Anybody who has had a script accepted is de facto a writer. But the question from an industrial point of view, the point of view of investment and return is: How good is the writer? It is very difficult when a man stands up and says, “ I am a writer. I can do as well as Irwin Shaw, Morris West, or Jack Smith.” You say, “How do you know?” He says, “I know I can, but nobody will give me the opportunity to prove it.” Unfortunately, this is half true. Nobody will give him the opportunity to prove it; he has to prove it himself. Analogously, as legislators you set yourself up on the hustings and say, “ I am a good legislator. Elect me ”, but you know extremely well that you just cannot do this. You have to prove it, either in the party, in public service, in local government. You must have proved it your- self by an act of election or by an act of choice, and then by practice. From the point of view of the producer—I have been a producer, and I am extremely interested in this whole question of production—the only criterion you can apply to the writer is this: Has he proved himself enough for you to risk on him one million dollars? That is the test. Jack Smith comes along and says, “ I have a good idea for a film.” You say, “ Fine. Let me see the idea.” He will present you with a sheet of paper with about 500 words on it and he says “ That is a good story.” The world is full of good stories. I may be labouring this point, but it is very important. You cannot get a star, a director or an editor, and most important of all you cannot get money until you have a star. So that when Jack Smith comes along with his little piece of paper you consider the gap that exists between that little piece of paper and the banker’s loan for two million dollars and the star’s signature on a contract showing he will play with you. You ask yourself whether this man can deliver all this into your hands. If he cannot you do not want him. This is elementary to the industry. I have been in this position in New York. You have a script. You take it to a star. He says “ Yes, I would love to play it ”. You are de facto richer by anything up to half a million dollars because the star is the person who brings the money into the box office. If you have him you go to a banker and you say, “ I have Franchot Tone.” He says “ Yes, he is worth half a million dollars,” and you have got the money. Then you go to a director and you say, “ Would you like to direct Franchot Tone in this script?” You produce the script and you get David Lean and you have 500,000 dollars for a start. Those are the facts of the industry and the fact of mounting a play in Broadway and the facts of the novel-writing industry. I can go to any publisher in the world and get 50,000 or 60,000 dollars for an unwritten book because I have proved myself. This same thing applies when you come to the next item in the production schedule—artists. Submissions have been made to the Committee that there are a large number of artists available. Again you have to define what an actor is. We have a large number of people who have a large number of Australian acting credits in broadcasting drama and television. There are a large number of people who have played in one commercial and they join Actors’ Equity. They are all actors in the definition of the Union, 3ut you must say, “ What is that actor worth to me in terms I>f an audience? ” Let me give you an example of this in he international sphere. I want to submit later to this Committee that this whole question of programmes is an nternational question; it is a question of export. We were lasting a play on Broadway—“ Daughter of Silence.” The cript was good and we had revised it and rewritten it. t was now July and we wanted the cast for the November eason on Broadway. By that time most of the fall plays iad been cast so that of the three men we wanted none ‘ere available. We had to go to Hollywood for a second r third string actor. We went to London for Emille Williams, but in New York he is perhaps a third string. ‘Q gambled on our Hollywood man. The producer tid “ That boy is just about to go over the hump to star- 3m. Maybe we can push him over.” The result was that  when we went to the angels to get our money, the angels said, “ You have got two third stringers, your prospects of success are correspondingly diminished because the audience goes to see the star, like it or not.” They go partly to see the film but partly to see the star. So, of the 170,000 dollars they would only supply 100,000 and the producer had to find the rest. Then again we came into New York with a low subscription. The thing works in a vicious circle. You run up against the problem where a local actor of good reputation says, “ I am as good an actor as Emille Williams.” You have to admit that he may be. You look at his list of credits and you find that maybe he is as good. Given the opportunity maybe he could be better, but what does he mean to the production? He may be a good staff member but you cannot feature him and you cannot gamble £400,000 which is what your television series will cost you. You cannot gamble that much money on these men. You will not get the money to finance the project in the international market because the man has no meaning there. I am not being airy-fairy about this. This is what exists in the industry and we have to live with what exists, not with what we would like to exist. I have dealt with the production, direction, writing and the artist. We have them all here in moderate quantities, but I suggest without distinction. Joan Sutherland is in New York and Peter Finch is away. What do we do? We have to look at the next thing. That is merchandising. There is no point in making programmes that you cannot sell. The plain fact of the matter is that you cannot make low-budget local programmes in Australia and get your money back. There is nothing in any legislation which prescribes that any country or organization must send itself bankrupt. This is the crux of the question. Unless television stations can get their money back with reasonable certainty they are not going to produce television programmes. Unless independent producers can sell their wares in the world market they are going to go bankrupt. By the

Chairman.—Could I interrupt you. Will you pre- face what you are going to say now by making some observation on this theme: We have had a lot of talk in this Committee on the aspect that we have potential talent but we cannot make programmes that are saleable overseas. It has been said that we should not try and copy programmes or drama using the American or British idiom because if we do so we will fail?
—I agree with that in terms of programme content. What type of stuff do we sell? We cannot sell westerns because the Americans make them better. We cannot sell Shakespearean because we cannot make them as well as the British and therefore we cannot export Shakespeare. What do we do?
—First of all we define for ourselves what we mean by an Australian programme. An Australian pro- gramme is a programme made with Australian capital in Australia, with Australian technicians, with part Aus- tralian actors and at least backed by Australian money. Subject has nothing to do with it. because by the time you have covered Essington Lewis and Kidman and the koala bear you have covered the Australian scene, but that does not cover our whole involvement with the world. We choose story subjects and drama subjects which bv geography and unfamiliarity can be made here and nowhere else, and made here quite well. New Guinea is a subject which is essentially ours. So are our relations with Indonesia and Borneo. These things are specifically ours. Then von sav “ Right, these are the stories.” hut if you want to sell them overseas, if yon want to make them so that they can he sold overseas you have to make them with acceptable international idiom both in writing and presentation. Thev have to be smooth and the speech of the actor has to he intelligible and pleasing to the general overseas audience. Tn other words there is an acceptable international accent. We had to face this problem risht from the davs of radio. If we were to sell syndicated programmes we had to con- form to an international accent. I take it you have some views about the Australian accent?—They are rather negative views in the sense that I do not denigrate the Australian accent. I have no objec- :ion to the American accent. It has become the lingua franca all throughout the world. The Japanese who speaks English speaks it with an American accent. Pidgin English used to be an acceptable lingua franca and it was com- menced by the Germans, Communication—and I stand or fall by this—depends on our attacking the problem to com- municate in the simplest and best possible way with ever- body else. As a novelist I had to find this out. I had to svrite in an international polished language that is as accept- able in translation as it is in its original shape. I have had to learn this and we must learn it in our film making but we cannot make—and I think I should press on to this final point—these things with our present resources. We need the assistance of name directors and name artists who will provide a frame and a presentation for our local people in an overseas medium. When we build our authority our own name will begin to grow. Naturally then we will get the other things that we need, and one of them is distribution. This, perhaps in my view, is the most important thing I have to say. The film business is an international business of interlocking international alliances of production and selling. The Italian film industry does not subsist alone. It subsists by all kinds of financial alliances with France, America and England and does in turn lock and interlock. A man who makes a film in Italy is assured—because of his financial alliances—not necessarily of making a for- tune, but of getting his money back and making a profit, because the people who are going to distribute his film have an interest in the financial make-up. So that before you start on creating this type of programme—I am not talking about the low budget local programme—you must form financial alliances with distributors in England, in America and on the Continent. You form financial alli- ances by putting money up yourself, by buying name stars, not necessarily top price stars, but name stars and name directors who inspire confidence in the international banks. Then you form your alliances and then, when your film is made, it is already sold for you because the distributors are putting up the money. Everybody who has been associ- ated with films knows that the surest way to bankruptcy is to make a film on your own money because when you have the film in the can all your own money is in it and the distributor says, “ How much do you want for it? I will give you half.” He says that because he knows that you have made it and you have to sell it, and, knowing that, he will sit there and sit there and sit there. Even in books, at my stage of the profession, it is customary to receive an advance before you write your next book because your agent says, “ Every writer can write a bad book. We will get a big advance before the book is written ”. The pub- lisher says, “ If I refuse an advance he will leave me and go to another publisher. On the other hand, if he writes a cracker he is going to double the advance, so I had better pay.” The same thing is done with films. You do not make one pennyworth of film until you have the money in the bank and your contracts signed. You have your contractor and your staff and your production facilities. You also have vour distributors and they have put their money into the production. Then you come to the tug-of-war as to who will control it. At first you may have to shade it. With the next one you get a little more control and you con- tinue to get more control as you establish a reputation. As for what the Government should do in this, I say emphatic- ally that the Government should not commit itself to quotas and if should not commit itself to tariffs. I believe that both quotas and tariffs will have political repercus- sions far bevond this industry. Because this industry is an internationally known industry, the repercussions of any tariff or quota imposition could be tremendous. The threat of auotas held over people who draw large dollar incomes from this country, the threat of quotas made not politic- ally but in business dealings, will bring co-operation very MR. quickly. If this industry was reputably financed, the repre- sentatives of it could go to the people who are drawing hundreds of thousands of dollars out of this country each year and say, “ Sooner or later this is going to blow up in our faces. We love you lack, and you love us, but vou have got to help us get the industry started here. Put some money into it so that you may have shares in it.” and you will get the thing going. The threat will be much stronger and less loaded than the imposition. This is a risky industry and the same tax provisions, suitably applied, perhaps as those applied to writers and to the oil industry in America, by way of rebates, lower rates of taxation, spread of earnings, and special export conditions are where the Government can best help. As for a subsidy, I say “ No ” because, as we have found with the Commonwealth Literary Fund, subsidy leads to feather bedding. If anybody can show me a great work of art that has been produced by the Commonwealth Literary Fund, I will give the Fund £1,000. 1 think that is about all I can usefully say at the moment. 

The witness withdrew. The Committee adjourned. (Taken at Sydney.)