About CSB

The Centre for Screen Business is a unit of AFTRS formed in 2005 to promote the development of business knowledge and skills in the screen content industries.

The Centre:

  • offers graduate courses in leadership and screen business to media professionals
  • conducts practical research to improve knowledge and knowhow in the sector, and
  • delivers workshops offering training in business development and leadership.

The Centre’s mission is to improve the sustainability of businesses in the sector by disseminating knowledge, skills, data and ideas to business owners and managers.

 

Staff

David Court (Head of Screen Business)

David Court is the founding Director of the AFTRS Centre for Screen Business.

David is an experienced industry practitioner who has been involved in the financing of more than a dozen film and television productions (including Strictly Ballroom, The Bank and the IMAX film Antarctica). He was the publisher of the authoritative industry newsletter Entertainment Business Review.

With KPMG, he conducted the feasibility study that led to the development of Fox Studios at the Sydney Showgrounds. As author of Film Assistance: Future Options (Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1986), he was the policy architect of the Film Finance Corporation, established by the Australian Government in 1988. With Sir Peter Jackson, he recently completed a review of the New Zealand Film Commission for the New Zealand Government.

David holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Tasmania and is working on a PhD in the Public Policy program of the Crawford School of Economics and Government at the Australian National University.

 

Nathan Anderson (Lecturer, Multiplatform Producer)

Nathan is a media entrepreneur and academic. Culminating in a Masters from AFTRS in 2010, Nathan has spent the past 15 years working on such films as The Matrix and Paradise Road in various production roles, as well as at leading advertising agencies and PayTV companies as an executive digital producer.

Nathan is now Managing Director at Envelop Entertainment, founded in 2009, a multiplatform production company with several interactive projects under development funded by Screen NSW, Screen Australia and in partnership with Southern Star, ABC and Hoodlum Active.


Robert Connolly (Writer, Director, Producer, Distributor)

Robert Connolly is the writer and director of the feature films The Bank (2001), Three Dollars (2005) and  most recently, Balibo (2009). He is the producer, with business partner John Maynard, of the award-winning films The Boys and Romulus, My Father, starring Eric Bana.

Robert has won two AFI awards for screenwriting for The Bank and Three Dollars. In 2007, Romulus, My Father won four AFI Awards including Best Film. As a director, he has screened his films in over thirty international film festivals including Toronto and San Sebastian. In 2010, Robert directed an episode of the television series Rush (Ten) and in 2011 was one of the featured directors on the acclaimed miniseries The Slap (ABC).

Robert received a Centenary Medal for services to the Australian Film Industry in 2001 and was part of the 2020 Ideas Summit in 2008 in Canberra. He is a member of the board of Screen Australia.