Event and Ticketing Details
Dates & Times
Monday 30 September
6:15 PM - 7:15 PM
Finally, Australian comedy is seeing a broader range of voices represented in writers’ rooms, on screen and behind the scenes. It’s making our entertainment funnier and sharper – and it’s enhancing its appeal for more Australians.
For Season Two of Get Krack!n co-creators Kate McLennan and Kate McCartney made inclusion and accessibility a production and creative focus. They co-wrote Episode Three, the Kates’ ‘one-day-of-the-year 30-minute International Day of People Living with a Disability special’, with disability activist Jess Walton and included artists like Adam Hills, Deaf performers Anna Seymour and Ashleigh Kedge and the musicians from The Sisters of Invention.
In this discussion, hosted by Alistair Baldwin and presented in partnership with The Other Film Festival, we’ll feature artists who worked on that hilarious and game-changing series. What was the process in the writers’ room and how did producers create an accessible production environment for all artists, cast and crew? What did they learn, what will they improve in future production processes and how can the screen sector, more broadly, go about making space for people who have not traditionally been represented across, and behind, our screens?
Presented in partnership with The Other Film Festival and Arts Access Victoria with the support of City of Melbourne and Screen Australia.
Drinks available for purchase on the night.
This event will be Auslan interpreted and live captioned.
Featuring
Alistair Baldwin
Alistair Baldwin is a writer and comedian based in Naarm / Melbourne. He has written for ABC's The Weekly, Get Krack!n, Hard Quiz & At Home Alone Together. Published works include pieces for un. Magazine, Archer, Metro and Black Inc.'s Growing Up Disabled In Australia anthology. He is 1/2 of the experimental (and toxic) comedy duo Nemeses with Vidya Rajan.
Kate McLennan
Kate McLennan is an award-winning writer, stand-up comedian and actress.
She is the co-writer of The Katering Show, where she plays an intolerable foodie alongside her food intolerant mate, Kate McCartney. The show launched on YouTube in 2015 and hit over 2 million views in its first week online. In 2016, a fresh new season of the hit series premiered on ABC iView. To date, the series is iView’s most viewed original series, has had over 9 million views on YouTube and the channel has over 100,000 subscribers. The pair have also written a short-form narrative comedy called Bleak, which originally launched on YouTube before it was made into a TV pilot for ABC’s Comedy Showroom in 2016.
In 2017, having conquered the world of satirical cooking shows, the Kates set their sights on the chirpy world of morning TV with their signature brand of social awkwardness and unprofessionalism in their full-length series titled Get Krack!n, which aired on the ABC that same year. The second and final season aired to much critical acclaim on the ABC in 2019.
Kate’s TV appearances include It’s A Date, Comedy Up Late, Winners & Losers, House Husbands, SlideShow, Offspring, Ricketts Lane and The Project. Most recently, Kate has had a guest appearance in Aunty Donna’s Glennridge Secondary College on YouTube. Her voice features in the animations 1001 Nights, Dogstar, The Flamin' Thongs, Wakkaville and Exchange Student Zero.
Kate has appeared in thirteen Melbourne International Comedy Festivals and performed stand-up comedy throughout Australia, the UK, US, Hong Kong and Singapore. Kate also toured India with MICF where she hosted the Roadshow and RAW Comedy competitions.
Both Kate McCartney and Kate McLennan won a 2018 AWGIE award for an episode of Get Krack!n and received an AWGIE for The Katering Show in 2015. The second season of The Katering Show was nominated for an AACTA award in 2016. The Katering Show won Best Short-Form Digital Series and tied for a Best of the Fest award at the New York Television Festival in 2015.
Jessica Walton
Jessica Walton is a picture book author, teacher, parent, daughter of a trans parent and proud queer disabled woman. She wrote Introducing Teddy: a story about being yourself to help explain gender identity in a simple, positive way to her kids. Introducing Teddy began as a Kickstarter project, but has now been published in the US, UK and Australia by Bloomsbury. It has also been translated into nine other languages. Jess lives in Pakenham with her wife, kids and cat.
Kate McCartney
Kate McCartney is a writer/director, illustrator, animator and performer.
Her work as a comedy performer and writer has featured in Big Bite, Hamish and Andy and Time Of Our Lives. Kate was a senior writer for Sam Simmons’ Problems, and further writing credits include Adam Hills Tonight, Dirty Laundry Live, Spicks and Specks and ABC3’s Little Lunch and You’re Skitting Me. She has appeared in Offspring and ABC series Outland.
Kate’s writing has been published in Penguin’s Thanks For The Mammaries and Penguin/Random House’s Women of Letters: Between Us.
In 2006, Kate’s animated short The Astronomer was selected for screened nationally and internationally. It was nominated for an Australian Film Industry award in 2006, and won Best 2-D Animation at Animex, 2007.
In 2015, Kate McCartney and writing partner Kate McLennan’s original concept The Katering Show was released on YouTube, clocking up millions of views. In 2016, the Kates returned with a fresh new season of the hit series premiering on ABC iView. To date, it has attracted over 4 million views and 60,000 subscribers.
With Kate McLennan, Kate McCartney was the co-recipient of the 2011 Kit Denton Disfellowship for Bleak. Bleak originally launched in 2014 on YouTube before it was made into a TV pilot for ABC’s Comedy Showroom in 2016.
Kate was the director of ABC hit comedy The Edge Of The Bush — a series created by writer and performer Anne Edmonds. Most recently she directed the Mandy McElhinney, Wayne Blair & Jenna Owen storyline in ABC TV’s series Squinters.
In 2017, Kate teamed up with Kate McLennan again for their new full-length ABC series titled Get Krack!n, where they set their satirical sights on the world of breakfast television.