Writer, producer, and director Taryne Laffar is NITV’s new commissioning editor.
With more than 15 years’ experience in the Australian screen industry, where she has also worked in casting, Laffar joins from Pink Pepper, a Western Australian First Nations, and female-owned production company she started in 2020, specialising in developing and producing Indigenous-led screen content.
The company’s debut project was documentary Our Law, an insight into the frontline of policing in Western Australia with unique access to Indigenous officers, recruits, and cadets attempting to change the system from within, for which she and Periscope Pictures’ Sam Bodhi Field received the 2020 Brian Beaton Award.
It has since been expanded into a series that NITV brought to full commission in 2021, with Laffar having also contributed to fellow NITV titles Our Stories and On Country Kitchen.
As commissioning editor, she will oversee the development and delivery of NITV’s slate of commissioned content across documentaries, drama, entertainment, and children’s programming.
A descendent from the Bardi and Jabbir Jabbir nations in the West Kimberley, Laffar said being chosen to work with First Nations producers and creators around the continent in bringing their stories to life on the channel was a “profound privilege”.
“The fact that NITV also invests in building and championing First Nations talent across the screen sector for me personally demonstrates the matriarchal values of where I come from and who I now am,” she said.
“My selection to this new role is a deep-rooted dedication to the deadly black women of my flesh and bones – my mother Carla Laffar, her mother Bridgette Buckeridge, and her mother Josephine Hunter and my daughters Koda and Fenix, and my Mim Mila Grey.”
Her appointment comes amid the delivery of NITV’s largest-ever slate of original content, including Network 10 co-commission, The First Inventors; and children’s show, Barrumbi Kids, which is up for Most Outstanding Children’s Program at the upcoming TV Week Logie Awards.
NITV head of commissions Marissa McDowell was pleased to welcome Laffar’s “extensive experience, creativity, and passion for authentic First Nations storytelling”.
“Taryne is dedicated to creating powerful stories by and about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and she’ll be a fantastic asset to our commissioning team. We’re excited to have her on board,” she said.
Laffar commences the role from today.