People

31% LULLABY
17% ARIA
52% HOWL AT THE MOON

Rebecca Summerton

Rebecca Summerton

She/Her
Producer

Rebecca is producer and founding member of Closer Productions.



She is a producer, with feature film credits including 52 Tuesdays, which won the directing award for World Cinema at Sundance and the Crystal Bear at Berlinale, and feature documentary Sam Klemke’s Time Machine which premiered at Sundance and in Official Selection at HotDocs and Rotterdam. Her most recent feature, Animals, was an official Irish/Australian co-production based on the acclaimed novel, and premiered at Sundance 2019.  

For television, Rebecca has made numerous documentaries including Dendy Award-winning I Want To Dance Better At Parties and 3-part arts series Hannah Gadsby’s Oz. Her television drama credits include the 6-part series F*!#ing Adelaide, which premiered at Series Mania and was the most watched ABC iView Original in 2018. She also produced The Hunting, a 4 x 1 hour drama series which premiered on SBS Television in August 2019 becoming SBS’ most successful commissioned drama at that time. Rebecca produced Aftertaste, a returnable 6 x 30 comedy drama for the ABC. The first season premiered at Berlinale Series Selects 2021 and was nominated for a Most Popular Comedy Logie in 2022, season 2 screened on ABCTV in July 2022 and has been nominated for four AACTA awards including Best Comedy Program.

Most recently, Rebecca produced the ABC factual series Eat The Invaders, hosted by Tony Armstrong, which aired in January 2025.

IMDB

22% SMOKE
19% MIRRORS
59% WIRES

Matthew Bate

Matthew Bate

He/Him
Writer & Director

Matthew Bate is a writer & director and founding member of Closer Productions.

Matthew's feature documentary Shut Up Little Man! premiered in competition at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival before screening theatrically across the U.S. His follow up feature Sam Klemke’s Time Machine premiered at the 2015 Sundance New Frontiers Program, winning Doc Aviv's Artistic Spirit Award and an AWGIE for best screenplay. Matthew’s 2022 feature documentary The Defenders won the Sydney Film Festival Audience Award and premiered on Amazon Prime.

In television Matthew was writer and director of the 3 part series Hannah Gadsby’s Oz, and co-creator & writer of 2 seasons of the Logie and AACTA nominated comedy series Aftertaste, starring Rachel Griffiths and Erik Thomson. In 2025 Matt was the creator and director of the six part factual series Eat The Invaders starring Tony Armstrong. 

Matthew’s shorts include I Want to Dance Better At Parties, which won the 2014 Dendy Award for Best Film, and The Mystery of Flying Kicks which premiered at SXSW and won the MIFF Best Documentary prize. His 2018 Virtual Reality work Summation of Force was selected for Sundance’s New Frontiers. In 2019 Matthew co-authored the augmented reality work The Book of Darryl published by MacMillan Press and was a producer on the Peabody-nominated Netflix Original The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone.


IMDB

8% COMPOSED
53% CONSUMED
39% JAZZ FINGERS

Sophie Hyde

Sophie Hyde

She/They
Director/Producer

Sophie Hyde is a founding member of Closer Productions and social impact company The Unquiet Collective.



Working primarily as a writer/director Sophie most recently directed Emma Thompson in the 4x BAFTA nominated comedy Good Luck To You, Leo Grande which premiered at Sundance 2022 selling to Searchlight in the US and Lionsgate UK.

Her debut feature drama 52 Tuesdays (director/producer/co-writer) won the Directing Award at Sundance and the Crystal Bear at the Berlinale. She directed and produced feature comedy Animals which starred Holliday Grainger and Alia Shawkat and was written by Emma Jane Unsworth based on her novel.

Sophie created, produced and directed episodic series F*!#ing Adelaide for ABC Australia, and limited series The Hunting for SBS.

She co-directed and produced feature documentary Life in Movement which won the Australian documentary prize at Sydney Film Festival.

Sophie believes strongly in nurturing the voices of other filmmakers and therefore also works as a  producer and Executive Producer on various projects including the  feature documentaries Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure , Sam Klemke’s Time Machine, In My Blood It Runs and the short documentary The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone, which released worldwide on Netflix and was nominated for a Peabody Award in 2023.

IMDB

23% SKATER
61% FILM-MAKER
16% TEA-MAKER

Bryan Mason

Bryan Mason

He/Him
Editor/DoP/Producer/Director

Bryan Mason is a founding member of Closer Productions. A multi skilled, award-winning editor and cinematographer, Bryan has worked across feature drama, documentary and television.


Most recently, he was cinematographer and editor for the 4x BAFTA nominated film Good Luck To You, Leo Grande directed by Sophie Hyde and starring Emma Thompson.

In 2015, he shot, edited and produced the Sundance and Berlin award winning 52 Tuesdays for which he won the Screen Editors of Australia award. He was cinematographer and editor on both Irish comedy Animals and Iranian/Australian drama My Tehran for Sale. 

His feature documentary credits include Australian Documentary Prize winner Life in Movement (director/editor/cinematographer) and Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure, for which he won an Australian Academy Award for editing. He edited feature documentaries Sam Klemke’s Time Machine, Embrace, Mother With A Gun and the acclaimed In My Blood It Runs. Recently he edited the short documentary The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone, which released worldwide on Netflix and was nominated for a Peabody Award in 2023.

Bryan’s television credits include the SBS 4x1 hour series The Hunting (editor), the ABC iView series F*!#ing Adelaide (cinematographer/editor/producer) and the AACTA nominated ABC comedy series Aftertaste S1 (editor) and Aftertaste S2 (cinematographer/editor).

IMDB

44% STORYTELLER
38% CURIOUS
18% DISRUPTOR

Maya Newell

Maya Newell

She/Her
Documentary Director

Maya is a director and impact producer. Her most recent documentary The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone premiered on Netflix worldwide as a Netflix Original, and was nominated for a peabody award. Her previous feature In My Blood It Runs about ten-year-old Arrernte/Garrwa boy Dujuan Hoosan and his community,  was produced by Sophie Hyde, Larissa Behrendt and Rachel Naninaaq Edwardson and made in collaboration with those onscreen.

It won Best Director at ADG Awards, was selected for Goodpitch² Aus, a Sundance Institute Fellowship, was nominated for Best Doc and best Cinematography at the AACTAs, premiered at Hotdocs Film festival and screened at many more. The families onscreen led a multi-year impact campaign targeting juvenile justice, education rand anti-racism - and notably Dujuan, the 10 yr old star of the film became the youngest person to address the Human Rights Council at the United Nations when speaking up to raise the age of incarceration from 10 to at least 14 and reform First Nations education in Australia.

Previously, Maya has made short documentaries, directed  Growing Up Gayby and  Gayby Baby, made with Charlotte Mars.  Gayby Baby screened at festivals internationally, was selected for  GoodPitch² Aus, broke cinema-on-demand records, was nominated for Best Doc at the ACCTAs, screens on Netflix us and Uk and sparked a national conversation about the rights of children raised in LGBTIQ families.

IMDB

7% BALLET
15% FOSSE
78% FREESTYLE

Sarah Wormald

Sarah Wormald

She/Her
Junior Producer

Sarah Wormald is an emerging producer who started working with Closer Productions in late 2018. Since joining the Closer team Sarah has been working closely with Producer Rebecca Summerton across many of the company’s projects. She has worked as a Producer’s Assistant across the development, production and delivery of ABC Comedy Aftertaste S1 and on The Hunting through pre-production to delivery, and as an Associate Producer on Aftertaste S2. Sarah also assisted with the post-production, delivery and release strategy of Closer’s feature film Animals, as well as working in-depth across Closer’s upcoming development slate. Most recently, Sarah produced the ABC factual series Eat The Invaders, hosted by Tony Armstrong, which aired in January 2025.

At the end of 2019 Sarah secured funding from the MRC for her first two short films, Everything ALL AT ONCE and Glasshouse, which she produced in 2020. Both films premiered at the Adelaide Film Festival 2020. Everything ALL AT ONCE was also officially selected for the BUFF Malmö Film Festival 2021 and Palm Springs International ShortFest 2021, where it was in competition for Best International Short. Her moaat recent short Are You Really The Universe?, supported by Adelaide Film Festival and The Helpmann Academy, and starring Tilda Cobham-Hervey and Antoine Jelk recently premiered at Adelaide Film Festival 2022 where it won the Audience Award for Best Short Film.

IMDB

29% AWAKE

8% ASLEEP

63% DREAM SEQUENCE

Scarlett Scherer

Scarlett Scherer

She/Her
Director's Assistant

Scarlett Scherer is a director and screenwriter living and working on Kaurna Land in South Australia. 

She works primarily across short films, music videos, and commercials. Formerly a Director and Associate Producer at Repeater Productions, Scarlett now works as a Director’s Assistant to Sophie Hyde at Closer Productions.

Former receipent of the Carclew Fellowship Award she’s undertaken study with NIDA, AFTRS, UCLA, and the Sundance Institute. She began her career making music videos, with three clips receiving ABC’s RAGE Wild One Feature Video Award. 

Her most recent short films have screened at the likes of Adelaide Film Festival, Flickerfest, St Kilda Film Festival & Melbourne Queer Film Festival. Her latest film Boyish was one of eight Australian films selected for Mardi Gras Film Festival’s 2025 My Queer Career Competition - Australia’s richest queer short film prize. 

Since 2021, Scarlett has worked consistently in long-form production across projects. Most recently, she was Director’s Assistant on Netflix’s My Brilliant Career, produced by Jungle Entertainment. As part of this three-month mentorship, she directed a breakaway unit and shadowed DGA award-winning director Anne Renton. 

Scarlett is currently developing her debut feature film – a coming-of-age story set in Berlin.

4% SMART
2% SEXY
94% RICHLY INSIGHTFUL 

Poppy Fitzpatrick

Poppy Fitzpatrick

she/her
Producer's Assistant

Poppy Fitzpatrick joined Closer in 2022 as Producer's Assistant to Rebecca Summerton and Sarah Wormald, after crewing on Aftertaste S2 and assisting in post-production delivery. Since then, she has assisted across a number of projects on the Closer's development slate, including working closely with Matthew Bate as lead researcher and additional writer on ABC series Eat the Invaders.

Poppy also produced award-winning short film Dragon's Breath, and most recently the Adelaide Film Festival/Samstag EXPAND Moving Image Commission project 5 STEPS FOR BETTER LIVING, MAXIMUM GAINS AND MANIFESTING YOUR MOST OPTIMISED SELF!, exhibited at the Samstag Museum in October 2025.

Poppy is developing an online documentary series titled She Mass Debates, which aims to hijack the social media algorithm with the sex education she never had. In 2022 Poppy was selected for the AFTRS Documentary Talent Camp, and attended AIDC as a Leading Light in 2023. Poppy also freelances as a photographer and writer. 

IMDB

51% DREAMER
42% WANDERLUST
7% SARCASM

Emma Clear

Emma Clear

she/they
Bookkeeper

UK born and raised, Emma travelled the world before moving to Adelaide, Australia after falling in love with the country and its people. 

Emma holds a variety of certificates and experience across The Arts, Events, Film, Finance and Business. 

2023 saw Emma selected as one of fifteen participants from across Australia & New Zealand to attend the NETFLIX Aus/NZ Production Accounting Intensive in Sydney. Allowing her to learn from industry experts how films are supported by their financial teams. Subsequent to this in 2024 Emma was selected as a Mentee in the South Australian Film Corporation Master/Apprentice Mentorship Program for Production Accounting.

Connecting with We Made a Thing in 2023 Emma took on her first film role as bookkeeper on the animated feature film 'Lesbian Space Princess' before joining Closer Film the following year. 

Emma also has a wide range of Event and Festival experience taking on a variety of roles including Photographer, Artist Support and Front of House. Highlights include being a Stage Assistant at WOMADelaide in 2022 for an incredible performance involving 120 on stage drummers and being part of the pre-match ceremonies team at the FIFA Women's World Cup 2023.

Emma is a passionate cinephile, she has been an active supporter of the Adelaide Film Festival for many years. In 2022 she travelled to Canada to volunteer at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival), the largest public film festival in the world. 

With a love for being creative, problem solving and providing great customer service Emma now looks to combine her skills in Finance with her passion for The Arts to build an exciting career.

IMDB

31% STRING
9% CHEWING GUM
60% DUCT TAPE

Raynor Pettge

Raynor Pettge

He/Him
Close(r) Friend

Raynor Pettge works as an editor, designer, and visual effects creator.

Cutting his teeth on TVCs and corporate films, Raynor has since provided effects and motion graphics for a number of visually rich productions including the Oscar-shortlisted animated film The Cat Piano, Sundance-selected documentaries Shut Up! Little Man: An Audio Misadventure, and Sam Klemke's Time Machine, as well as TV series such as Danger 5, Hannah Gadsby's Oz, The Hunting, and most recently ABC series Eat The Invaders. Raynor has also provided VFX and graphics work on feature films such as The Infinite Man, Hotel Mubai, and Animals.

IMDB

15% NOBODY'S PERFECT
62% I LOVE YOU, TOO
23% SHUT UP AND DEAL

Matthew Cormack

Matthew Cormack

He/Him
Close(r) Friend

Matthew is an AACTA and AWGIE-winning screenwriter. His writing credits include feature film 52 Tuesdays (Crystal Bear at Berlinale Film Festival, AWGIE Award for Original Screenplay), episodic series F*!#ing Adelaide for ABC, award-winning short film My Last Ten Hours with You, and writer and co-creator of limited series The Hunting for SBS (AACTA Award for Best Screenplay in Television).

Matthew has also worked in development, production, and sales with Closer Productions across such projects as feature documentaries Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure, Life in Movement and Sam Klemke's Time Machine, hybrid doco/drama I Want to Dance Better at Parties, co-creator of transmedia project My 52 Tuesdays, and script editor on feature drama Animals and ABC series Aftertaste.

For direct enquiries, contact: sallym@shanahan.com.au

IMDB

23% BAT
37% CROW
40% DOLOMITE

Matt Vesely

Matt Vesely

He/Him
Close(r) Friend

Matt Vesely is a South Australian writer and director, working across TV & Film. Matt works as a story producer, writer and development executive with award-winning South Australian collective Closer Productions.

Matt’s latest short, System Error, was selected for the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival and opened the 2021 St Kilda Film Festival. His debut feature film, the science fiction thriller Monolith starring Lily Sullivan (Evil Dead Rise), was selected to have its international premiere at South By South West in 2023. He is represented by HLA Management in Australia and XYZ Management in the US.

For direct enquiries contact: hla@hlamgt.com.au

IMDB

72% IDEALIST
8% PANIC
20% CAKE

Tilda Cobham-Hervey

Tilda Cobham-Hervey

She/Her
Close(r) Friend

Tilda Cobham-Hervey began her career at age 12 with renowned physical theatre company, Force Majeure, in the hit show The Age I'm In. At age 14 she was a founding member of the award winning Circus company Gravity and Other Myths.

In 2011 Tilda starred in Closer Productions award winning feature film, 52 Tuesdays, directed by Sophie Hyde and was dubbed one of the breakout stars of the 2104 Sundance film festival.

In 2016 she made her television debut in two high profile mini series, The Kettering Incident and Barracuda and was subsequently nominated for the Outstanding Newcomer Award at the 2017 Logies. In 2017 Tilda was nominated for a Helpmann Awards for her performance in Andrew Bovell’s play Things I Know To Be True. In early 2017, Tilda completed filming feature film Hotel Mumbai which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in 2018. Also in 2017, Tilda wrote and directed a short film, A Field Guide To Being A 12-Year-Old Girl, which won the Crystal Bear at the 2018 Berlinale.

In 2018, Tilda was seen in Closer Productions web series, F*#ing Adelaide and also starred in two US feature films, Burn and Flinch. Later that year Tilda took on one of her most prominent roles to date, playing Helen Reddy in the biopic I Am Woman, which opened the Special Presentations category at the 2019 Toronto Film Festival. In 2019 Tilda co-directed the short animation, Roborovski with Dev Patel which went on to win the Award for Best Australian Short Animation at Flickerfest in 2021. During this year she also wrote two feature length screenplays, Irma Voth, for Closer Productions and Sheila for Revolver.

In 2021 Tilda created an immersive theatre experience called Two Strangers Walk Into A Bar… for the Adelaide Fringe Festival that garnered great reviews. She is currently acting in the TV show The Lost Flowers Of Alice Hart for Amazon. 

IMDB

31% ROMANTIC
67% PASSIONATE
2% CHAOS

Tamara Hardman

Tamara Hardman

She/Her
Close(r) Friend

Tamara is a writer/director working on Kaurna Land in South Australia. Her short films have played at both national and international festivals including Byron Bay Film Festival, Flickerfest, Adelaide Film Festival, BUFF Malmo and Palm Springs International ShortsFest. Her short film Are You Really The Universe? starred Tilda Cobham-Hervey and won Best Short Film at the 2022 Adelaide Film Festival. In 2024, she was accepted in the Australians in Film Untapped Writing Program where she developed feature film Forget Me, Not alongside co-writer Sophie Morgan. 

She has worked as a director's assistant across Closer's film and TV slate including Good Luck To You, Leo Grande, SBS series The Hunting, feature documentary In My Blood It Runs, and most recently JIMPA.

IMDB