Tie cash to content to keep our tales alive: David Williamson

FUNDING for film, television and theatre should be explicitly linked to local content, according to playwright David Williamson.

PUBLIC funding for film, television and theatre should be explicitly linked to local content, according to playwright David Williamson, who says Australian stories are at risk of becoming expendable.

Williamson, speaking last night at Melbourne's Wheeler Centre to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Australian Writers Guild, of which he is emeritus president, said there was a "growing inevitability" in Australia about the erosion of local content on stage and screen that needed to be addressed.

Read Williamson's speech here.

"Investment (in the arts) needs to be linked to very clear, tangible cultural outcomes - to Australian ideas, scripts, concepts and intellectual property," he said.

"There is no question the industry needs investment if it is to create Australian content. But providing the funds, without linking them to the creation of that Australian content is . . . potentially ruinous."

Williamson cited as a particular area of concern the government's film producers' offset - a 40 per cent taxpayer-funded rebate - and the "significant Australian content" films require for qualification.

Ahead of last night's speech, Williamson told The Australian there was a real danger of foreign companies taking advantage of the system.

"The danger is what we'll really get is American movies and American stories subsidised by our taxpayers' money," he said. "That wasn't the intention of the scheme."

The most recent example was Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby - in which Williamson's son Felix had a role - being filmed in Sydney.

"The Great Gatsby has provided some employment for my son Felix, who is playing a French butler," Williamson said. "Of course, the lead is Leonardo DiCaprio, and maybe there's nothing wrong with that. Maybe there's nothing wrong with the fact it's not an Australian story, but that it's a quintessential American story. But some would argue that just having an Australian director doesn't really mean it has any essential Australian qualities; I don't know."

The Gallipoli screenwriter told the audience last night the offset was supposed to be about "Australian intellectual property being given the leg-up it needs to attract international finance and distribution".

Williamson, whose Australian-centric works include Don's Party and The Club, said Australia's flagship theatres, while deserving a larger slice of Australia Council funding, needed to place Australian work at the heart of their programming.