When the Italian critic Ricciotto Canudo named cinema the "sixth art" in 1911, he could hardly have foreseen that film, like Zeus against the Titans, could stand to unseat the established art forms that birthed it.

But as live events like theatre, concerts and even stand-up comedy fall into the ever-expanding grasp of cinema and Netflix, high-art bastions like Opera Australia are increasingly making room for film in their creative strategy.