Suzanne Baker

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Suzanne Dale Baker AM (* 1939 ) is an Australian journalist and former film producer .

Life

Baker was the eldest child of journalists Sidney John Baker (1912-1976) and Sally Baker Clinch (1913-2004). The parents divorced in 1950. Baker grew up in Sydney where she attended Sydney Girls High School. After finishing school, she first worked on documentaries for the Australian television station TCN-9 , then went briefly to Channel 10 and then worked in London ( BBC , Thames TV ) and New York ( NBC ).

She returned to Australia in the early 1970s and started working as an editor for Look! , the women's division of the Sydney Morning Herald . During this time she became increasingly involved in women's issues and was one of the founders of the Media Women's Action Group, which investigated discrimination against women in the media. At the same time, she later devoted herself to taboo subjects as a producer, for example the 30-minute documentary Seeing Red and Feeling Blue in 1976 dealt with menstruation . Her first film work after her return to Australia was an episode of the documentary series Checkerboard .

Baker joined Film Austria in 1974 and worked there as a producer until 1984. Their biggest success was the Oscar winning for Leisure in 1977. She became the first Australian who won an Academy Award, but was unable to answer him. The Australian Film Commission, which had a limited budget for flights overseas, had refused to pay for the flight to Los Angeles in advance.

After winning the Oscar, Baker made several documentary series, including one on the Labor movement. Her five-part documentary series The Human Face of China , for which she was allowed to shoot in China for five months in 1978, attracted attention . The film team was the first international team to be allowed to film certain aspects of everyday life in China and to shoot in locations that were closed to visitors at the time. Among other things, one episode was dedicated to a working class family who lives in a newly built small town not far from Shanghai, as well as the acrobats of the Shinsi Provincial Acrobatic Troupe.

Although Baker was also interested in feature films, her advances in this direction remained without results. In 1984 she retired from the film business. After her retirement, Baker began studying history at the University of Sydney , which she completed with a BA in 2003.

Some of their personal papers and correspondence, among others, from the time the Academy Awards, handed Baker as premature legacy to the State Library of New South Wales.

Filmography (selection)

  • 1967: The Australian Male - A Bird's Eye View
  • 1975: Sister, If You Only Knew
  • 1975: A Say in Your Community with the Australian Assistance Plan
  • 1976: Leisure
  • 1976: Seeing Red and Feeling Blue
  • 1979: The Human Face of China (five-part documentary series)
  • 1979: Saturday
  • 1983: The Weekly's War
  • 1984: After the Flood
  • 1986: Land of Hope (TV series)

Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See history and graduates of the school
  2. ↑ Nan Musgrove: New Fields for Two TV Women . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , Aug. 28, 1974, p. 10.
  3. ↑ More a gurgle than a splash . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , Oct. 27, 1976, p. 111.
  4. ^ What Oscar did next . smb.com, March 15, 2003.
  5. ^ The Line-Up for 1980 . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , February 6, 1980, p. 53.
  6. ↑ Heather Waby: Ten Scoops the Pool . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , June 25, 1980, p. 19.
  7. ↑ James Murray: China Blockbuster for TV. Dream comes true for Australian producers . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , April 1980, 15.
  8. ↑ See Collection Record Details on acms.sl.nsw.gov.au
  9. ^ The Henry Lawson Festival . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , July 16, 1980, p. 13.
personal data
SURNAME Baker, Suzanne
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Baker, Suzanne Dale (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Australian journalist and former film producer
DATE OF BIRTH 1939