Australian director Anton Beebe has signed with bicoastal/international Chelsea Pictures for representation in the U.S. and Canada. He will be moving to Los Angeles to join the production company’s office there in two weeks.
With Pod Films, Sydney, which continues to represent him in Australia, Beebe directed "Barking Dog," "Little Girl," "Eye Test" and "Box Head" for SBS World News via BAM SSB, Sydney; "The Wall" for Young & Rubicam, Adelaide, and FAI Insurance’s "Mercury" for FCB, Sydney.
After graduating in ’90 from the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, Sydney, with a bachelor of arts degree in directing, Beebe joined Sydney-based The Film Business; in ’93, he formed now defunct Sydney production house Temenos with partner Mary-Joy Lu. He joined Pod Films in ’99.
Beebe said he was dissatisfied with what he termed the industry’s "social realism approach" that’s currently popular in Sydney. "Stylistically, I wasn’t getting work that I wanted to explore," he explained. "I think cinema is still largely unexplored in terms of cinematic language, and that’s where I get my excitement: trying to find a way to express an emotion and a rhythm."
Allison Amon, Chelsea’s executive producer, commented, "Anton had decided he wanted representation in the States, and was considering a move. Through some of our contacts [in Australia], he was given a list of places to talk to when he hit Los Angeles. We were on that list, and once I took a look at his reel, I was really excited to talk to him. I think he was very much attracted to Chelsea’s visual storytelling style."
While the shop maintains a Sydney office and has developed relationships with several other Australian directors, Chelsea president Steve Wax noted, "We also know the reality of the American market: It’s much better if you’re here."
Wax was enthusiastic in his appreciation of Beebe’s style: "It’s got this great, surreal quality. We base our judgments first of all on filmmaking, and secondarily on storytelling. In a way, it all started with Mehdi Norowzian, who pioneered a kind of surreal storytelling. Anton—in his own way—shows those same strengths." (Norowzian, also represented by Chelsea, directed the Oscar-nominated short film Killing Joe.)
"Evolving from pure visuals to storytelling is really what defines the best work in the advertising business right now," Wax continued. "I think Anton will be very much a player in that world. There are a lot of people coming out of a technical background whose work is cold. What’s special about his work is that it flows in a plastic film way, and he gives it a human touch."
Chelsea Pictures’ roster of directors includes Norowzian, Alex Proyas, Nicholas Barker, Simon Blake, Matthew Harris, The Haxans (Robin Cowie, Eduardo Sanchez, Daniel Myrick, Gregg Hale and Michael Monello), Janusz Kaminski, Steve Rogers, Peter Salmi, Todd Solondz and Andrew Walton.
Chelsea Pictures’ reps are Marguerite Juliussen and Dawn Ratcliffe of Juliussen Ratcliffe, Chicago, in the Midwest; Mary Vandamme, San Francisco, on the West Coast; and Robin Hauck in Boston and Angelina Powers in New York for the East Coast.
