Monday 12 January 2015

BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY : AFRO-AUSTRALIAN " WAYNE BLAIR " IS AN AUSTRALIAN WRITER, ACTOR AND DIRECTOR SEEN MOST RECENTLY ON BOTH SIDES OF THE CAMERA IN RED FERN NOW : GOES INTO THE " HALL OF BLACK GENIUS "

     BLACK        SOCIAL       HISTORY                                                                                                                  

































































































Wayne Blair


Wayne Blair
Wayne Blair.jpg
Born28 November 1971
Australia
OccupationTelevision & film director, writer and actor
Wayne Blair (born 28 November 1971) is an Indigenous Australian writer, actor and director, seen most recently on both sides of the camera in Red fern Now. He is also the director of the highly successful feature film The Sapphires.

Early life

Blair was born in Taree to Julie and Bob Blair. He has two older sisters, Janet and Mandy. Though he was born in Taree, he describes himself as a Batjala Mununjali Wakkawakka man.[1]
Bob Blair was a soldier, so the young Wayne moved around. While Blair was still young, his father was posted to Woodside in South Australia, then when Wayne was a teenager his family was sent to Rockhampton. In Rockhampton he excelled at cricket and rugby, then later became interested in acting and dancing at school. Blair had a job as a tour guide at Rockhampton's Dream time Cultural Centre, where he was also one of the dancers. He went on to do a marketing degree, though his elective subjects included Comic Drama and Australian Drama. He briefly went to Sydney to play rugby league for the Canterbury Bulldogs under-21s.[2] After a failed audition for NIDA in 1992, he eventually did a three-year course at the Queensland University of Technology in acting.[3]

Career highlights

Blair's first recorded on-screen appearance was in a 1997 Australian TV film called The Tower. The following year he appeared on All Saints and Wildside. He has also appeared in Water Rats and Fireflies. 1998 was also the year he was one of the first four film makers to be mentored under the Metro Screen Indigenous Mentor Scheme for which he made a short film called Fade 2 Black. Ten years later he was to become a mentor himself under the same scheme.[4]
Blair starred in the original stage production of Tony Briggs's play, The Sapphires in 2005.[5] This play was later turned into a filmscript to be directed by Blair.
In 2007 he starred as Othello for Bell Shakespeare, a show that toured Australia with stops at Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra as well as other cities. He also directed three episodes of Lockie Leonard with a further four in 2010.
In 2008 Blair directed all thirteen episodes of the Australian children's TV series Double Trouble, about twin Indigenous girls separated at birth. In 2009 he wrote an episode of the second season of The Circuit. 2010 saw Blair direct four episodes of the Australian-British children's supernatural comedy TV series, Dead Gorgeous. He directed British-Jamaican Debbie Tucker Green's play Dirty Butterfly and co-directed the biographical play, Namatjira, with Scott Rankin who also wrote the play, both plays at Sydney's Belvoir St Theatre.[6] He was also chosen in the same year as one of the stars of the Sydney Theatre Company's revival of Sam Shepard's True West, directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman.[7]
Wayne Blair was awarded the Bob Maza Fellowship for 2011 by Screen Australia to provide opportunities for career development.[8] 2012 was a big year which saw the making of his hit film, The Sapphires, which brought him recognition around the world with a very positive response at Cannes.[2] Later in the year he starred in three episodes of the ABC's TV drama series, Redfern Now and directed another of the episodes. To finish the year Blair was included in Variety Magazine's top ten directors to watch in 2013.[9]

Filmography

Films

YearTitleCreditRoleNotes
2015Septembers of ShirazDirector
2013NotesThanksShort film
The TurningMax
2012The SapphiresDirector
Wish You Were HereWillis
2011XBob
The Last Time I Saw Michael Gregg
2009BlessedJames Parker
RalphWriterShort film
2005The Djarn DjarnsDirector and WriterWayne the Compare
2002Black TalkDirector
2001MulletJames

Television

YearTitleCreditRoleNotes
2013The Broken ShoreBobby WalsheTV Movie
The Elegant Gentleman's Guide to Knife FightingDirector3 episodes
The Gods of Wheat StreetMini-series
2 episodes
2012-2013Redfern NowDirector and WriterAaron DavisDirected 2 episodes
Wrote 1 episode
Acted in 5 episodes
2010Dead GorgeousDirector4 episodes
2009The CircuitWriterMini-series
1 episode
2008Double TroubleDirector13 episodes
2007-2010Lockie LeonardDirector and WriterDirected 8 episodes
Wrote 1 episode
2007Jackie JackieKoori SalesmanTV Movie
2006Small Claims: The ReunionDet. Lacey
2004Small ClaimsDet. Snr. Const. Lacey
FirefliesWayne PattersonSeason 1, Episode 5
2000Water RatsRidley WinterSeason 5, Episode 25
1998WildsideWesSeason 1, Episode 34
All SaintsKenny BaxterSeason 1, Episode 21
1997The TowerDJ DanTV Movie

Awards

Blair was nominated for Best Screenplay in a Short Film in 2005, at the AFI Awards for his work on The Djarn Djarns. In 2012, he was nominated for Best Direction for his film,The Sapphires.

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