Kate Hynes and Kerrin McNeil have started new production company Good Apples Pictures, with a launch slate that includes factual environmental series My Resilient Home and the mid-life roller derby dramedy series Fat Rollz.
The company, to be based in South East Queensland, will have a focus on creator-led stories that strike the balance between entertainment and real world impact.
Hynes and McNeil have worked together for almost 20 years in various different roles and capacities, with the most recent chapter at Hoodlum Entertainment – Hynes as head of business and legal affairs and McNeil as producer, head of development and head commercial affairs and marketing. In addition to her work at Good Apples Pictures, Hynes is media and entertainment partner at Keypoint Law and serves as deputy director of Trade and Investment Queensland.
“We just love working together,” McNeil tells IF.
“We have similar values and ideas, and have been in the trenches in lots of different ways together, and know how we work together well.”
Both producers have come together in the new venture as want to work on stories can make meaningful contribution to public conversation on issues, while still being entertaining at the same time – “that’s at the base of everything”. The focus is on local talent and bold storytelling that challenges the status quo.
To that end, McNeil is producing the Storytelling for Change panel at Screen Forever this week, which examines how producers and writers tackle the complex societal and moral issues of our time. Speakers include Elise McCredie, Tony Ayres, Belinda Chayko and Malinda Wink.
“I think we learned over the last three years, the power of media, both for good and for bad, and the importance of having very considered approach to stories. People watch television, watch films for entertainment first. So how can we capitalise on that while also using that medium for doing greater good in the world?” Hynes tells IF.
Good Apple Pictures will be shopping its launch projects, My Resilient Home and Fat Rollz, to market at Screen Forever this week.
Fat Rollz is the first of a number of projects that Good Apple Pictures is developing that has female-led comedy at its core. Centred on female characters at mid-life when there is “a lot of hilarity in all the things that go on”, both producers believe it speaks to a largely underserved audience in Australia.
“It’s tackling the dual issues of middle age for women, but also women in sports and all of the issues that go along there. And then the combination of those two things; middle aged women in sports can be funny sometimes,” Hynes says.
The climate-change focused My Resilient Home examines how people people whose homes have been destroyed by environmental disasters rebuild, with a particular focus on the most recent floods in Queensland and the Northern Rivers of NSW.
“How do they build back better, but how do they actually go through that journey of feeling like they’re going to be safe at home again? It’s a very personal journey,” Hynes says.
With participant’s story at the heart, the series will touch on both architecture and the environment. My Resilient Home is in late stage development, with the producers looking at creating a pilot now.