Interesting stories about women can be hard to find on screen and stage, according to actress-turned-producer Marta Dusseldorp.
"Female stories are really complex and really, they're thin on the ground," she says.
So she's doing something about it.
The star of television's Janet King, A Place to Call Home and Jack Irish formed a production company in 2019 with her husband, actor Ben Winspear, and set about commissioning projects that gave women a voice.
Their company, Archipelago Productions, mounted a series of female-led stage productions in Hobart, where the couple live. Then, when the pandemic hit, Dusseldorp had an idea for a TV series.
She pitched it to writer Andrew Knight, best known for his work on SeaChange, Rake and Jack Irish.
"I said, 'Let's build a show together, set here in beautiful Tasmania,'" Dusseldorp recalls.
"And he said yes. Later he told me he didn't mean it, he was just trying to get me off the phone. But I kept bugging him and ringing him and going, 'What about this idea? What about this idea?'
"Finally he's like, 'Alright'."
That idea became the new ABC TV series Bay of Fires, a dark comedy about a wealthy businesswoman, played by Dusseldorp, on the run from hit men. She hides with her children in a remote Tasmanian town only to find the locals are strange and somewhat sinister.
Dusseldorp describes Bay of Fires as "Ozark meets Fargo meets Schitt's Creek".
The series is populated by complex female characters. Alongside Dusselsorp the show stars Rachel House (Heartbreak High), Kerry Fox (Conversations With Friends), Pamela Rabe (Wentworth), Yael Stone (Orange Is The New Black), and Roz Hammond and Emily Taheny (both from Mad As Hell).
There's also Toby Leonard Moore (Billions), Stephen Curry (The Castle), Matt Nable (Mr Inbetween) and Nicholas Bell (Wanted).
Dusseldorp, who is credited as a producer and one of the creators (her co-creators are Knight and writer Max Dann), enjoyed the chance to flex her comedy chops on TV.
"Andrew Knight said to me, 'This is an opportunity to show a little bit of your funny,'" she says.
"I do it on stage a lot. I've never had the opportunity on screen, so I could fail spectacularly.
"But I didn't mind that this would be a risk, because I thought the whole thing is a risk."
Actresses becoming producers
Dusseldorp joins an impressive list of actresses who also produce. It includes Claudia Karvan, Leah Purcell, Rachel Griffiths, Cate Blanchett, Rebecca Gibney, Nicole Kidman and Margot Robbie. Most of their projects are focused on telling female stories.
Internationally, there's Reese Witherspoon, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Michaela Coel, Sharon Horgan, Taraji P Henson, Salma Hayek and Elizabeth Banks, to name a few.
Dusseldorp's first foray into producing was as an associate producer on Janet King, where she was involved in the "creative control elements as we built Janet season after season".
"So I knew that I was capable of sitting at the table with the creators and really being helpful. And also I was willing to fail and kind of bumble around and also go, 'If this doesn't help, just tell me to shut up.'"
Dusseldorp went on to work with Fremantle Australia, the production company behind the rebooted Heartbreak High (it's also co-producing Bay of Fires). Dusseldorp says it was here she learned about developing her own projects.
"I built some shows with them and we pitched them out, and they didn't necessarily go. So I thought, 'Oh, this is interesting. We spend all this time building a story, and then you get a no'," she says.
"But my whole life has been no, no, no, yes. No, no, no, no, no, no, yes."
Then the pandemic started.
"As we know, everyone's world changed, stopped, broke," she says. "I took what I learned and thought, can I do this on my own? And I thought, yes."
'Is this normal?'
At times, Dusseldorp says, she does reach out to other actress-turned-producers for support and advice, like Claudia Karvan, who produced Bump and Doctor Doctor.
"I've been watching Claude for a long time doing amazing things," Dusseldorp says.
"She was one of the first people I called when I thought, maybe I can do this. And I rang her and I said, 'Claude, how do I go about this without feeling silly, arrogant, you know? What do I do?'
"And she said, 'Oh Mart, you just work with people you trust and who trust you. It's about mutual respect and community and telling stories with people that you want to tell stories with.'
"I did ring Claude during the shoot once and went, 'OK, is this normal?' She said, yes, it was 'totally normal. Stay calm, keep going.'"
Karvan has been a producer for two decades, starting with Love My Way in 2004. She told the ABC she's been working with female producers since the beginning of her acting career.
"Hilary Linstead produced the first film I was in, Molly, in 1983," Karvan says.
"I have been extremely lucky to have been involved in so many early productions with women in leadership positions.
"I may not have been conscious of it at the time but it must have influenced my outlook and I am so grateful for that."
Karvan says her producer peers and friends include Rebecca Gibney (Under the Vines), Amanda Higgs (Secret Life of Us), Imogen Banks (Offspring) and Joanna Werner (The Newsreader). "We know we could reach out to each other for advice," she says.
She also names producer John Edwards, "who created my first producing opportunity with Love My Way and who I continue to collaborate with, more recently on Bump".
Dusseldorp says she's also had great conversations with Leah Purcell, who produced and directed The Legend of Molly Johnson and runs the company Oombarra Productions.
"We message each other all the time when we see each other's work and say, 'Well done, you were amazing, that was incredible,'" Dusseldorp said.
"For any kind of problem-solving I know I could reach out to [Karvan and Purcell]. And yeah, they pick up the phone. It's really nice."
'I'm not into cancel culture'
In the past the film and TV industry has had a reputation of being a boys' club, with a poor record on sexism and ageism, both onscreen and behind the camera. This was only confirmed by the Me Too movement, which rippled throughout the local industry.
Dusseldorp says in her experience, things are changing for the better.
"I think there's definitely the right language now," she says. "You can walk into a room and be assured that if it isn't being led the way it should, that there is language to introduce to the room to change that at the time.
"Now I feel really safe in that and assured in that, and it's just about giving a little signal saying, 'Oh, we don't joke like that anymore.' And it just nips it in the bud and means you can get on with the with the job at hand.
"I'm not into cancel culture myself. I see that there's reasons for it sometimes. It's a good warning shot, you know, if there needs to be one. But I think also we need to have everyone at the table to make real change, so that people aren't doing anything in the back rooms going, 'Ah, we're just going to do it anyway.'
"If everyone's at the table, then I think real change can happen.
"For me it's a live document. It's a live conversation."
Rise of streaming services
Dusseldorp says streaming services have provided more spaces for women's stories to be told, and she's pleased there are plans for Australian content quotas to be introduced for streaming companies.
"I see that as a real opportunity to reinvest in who we are and what we stand for. And I just think that's going to grow their market and their diversity on their platforms as well," she says.
"I'm dreaming up as many stories as I can to cram into the next 20 years of my life that I think are interesting and cutting-edge for women, [and] creating women that I haven't seen in Australia yet."
Watch Bay of Fires Sundays at 8.30pm on ABC TV and ABC iview.