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https://theconversation.com/a-look-into-the-decades-of-labour-that-helped-bring-lgbtqia-stories-to-australian-tv-261670>
"When the Seven Network’s Bevan Lee created the story of James Bligh, a gay man
living in 1950s Australia, in
A Place to Call Home (2013–18), it was the
culmination of a lifetime of work in commercial TV.
Lee’s success shows the importance of queer labour in getting queer stories in
Australian television.
When I interviewed Lee for my research, his advice to emerging creatives was:
“Don’t just, for the sake of being representative, drop one [queer character]
into a show”.
“For the first 30 years of my career, and on most of our shows […] I did that,
because it was the only way of getting them in,” he said.
I would argue Lee spent his career blazing the trail that makes this advice
possible.
He is one of ten lesbian, gay and bisexual television creatives and executives
featured in my new study about the motivations, barriers and labour behind the
queer stories that appear on Australian screens.
These industry leaders are working in what gender and sexuality studies scholar
Margot Canaday describes as the “straight work world”. My research identifies
the hurdles this world can present to developing queer stories for mainstream
TV, as well as how queer industry leaders manage to jump them."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
