Stan & ACTF Launch Original Film Initiative

Stan and the Australian Children’s Television Foundation (ACTF) have put out a call for pitches in an initiative to bring original family-friendly films to the Australian streaming service.

Applications are now open for feature-length, live-action film ideas with a G or PG rating. Stan and the ACTF are looking for highly marketable concepts that will appeal to children ages 6 to 12 and their families.

With this initiative, Stan and the ACTF aim to support Australian writers, producers and creators. As such, they expect the projects to have an Australian voice and point of view. The pitches submitted must be within the budget range of A$4 million to A$4.5 million ($3 million to $3.3 million). Submissions are due by September 13.

The chosen applicants will enter a development agreement with the ACTF and separately with Stan, as well as a commissioning and licensing agreement with Stan and an investment and distribution agreement with the ACTF.

“The Morrison Government is pleased to see the ACTF partner with Stan to bring high-quality new content to Australian children and their families to enjoy, as well as providing excellent opportunities for Australian writers, creators and producers,” said Paul Fletcher, minister for communication, urban infrastructure, cities and the arts.

Cailah Scobie, chief content officer at Stan, said, “The partnership between ACTF and Stan is another strong signal of Stan’s investment and commitment to produce original content for Australian audiences—and in this case our youngest audiences. ACTF has supported high-quality children’s content for nearly 40 years and are leaders in their field, and we welcome this collaboration and working with the sector to bring these feature films to life.”

Jenny Buckland, ACTF’s CEO, added, “The ACTF wants to support high-quality Australian children’s content on all the platforms children engage with, and for a long time we have admired the original Australian content Stan has been commissioning for adult audiences. So we are absolutely thrilled that Stan is now stepping into the children’s space with this commitment to children’s films and looking forward to working with Stan in this partnership.”