Actor Hugo Weaving joins board of Adelaide Film Festival
Hugo Weaving – whose resume already covers Lord of the Rings, The Matrix and Marvel – is getting a new leading role in the Adelaide Film Festival.
Entertainment
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Acclaimed Australian actor Hugo Weaving is joining the Adelaide Film Festival board in a huge coup for the event which this year recorded a 20 per cent rise in ticket sales.
Weaving, who has starred in blockbusters such as the Matrix trilogy, The Lord of the Rings and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, has been appointed to the board for a three-year term.
“Adelaide has long been a major Australian arts hub, and the Adelaide Film Festival not only celebrates — in its unique way — some of the most innovative films from around the world, but also plays a leading role in nurturing, financing and exhibiting significant new Australian film,” Weaving said.
The festival also announced it has defied the pandemic to post a huge box office increase, compared with its last event in 2018.
Creative director Mat Kesting described the result as “remarkable” considering 2020’s challenges.
“To have achieved this with socially distanced, checker-board seating reducing our capacity by 50 per cent and a smaller selection of films is truly remarkable,” he said.
“I am proud and delighted that we can declare the festival to be a resounding success.”
Weaving, 60, joins other new board members including Aboriginal screenwriter and director Rebecca Cole; Joshua Fanning and Marianna Panopoulos.
SA producer and entrepreneur Anton Andreacchio will take over as board chair.
The biennial festival screened 54 feature films from 40 countries. The festival was scheduled to end on Sunday but extended its program by five days because of popular demand.