Lights, camera, action for new Docklands film and TV sound stage, Stage 6
A massive new $46 million sound stage at Docklands Studios Melbourne (DSM) opened less than two months ago and is already booked up through next year and into 2024.
Stage 6, designed by Grimshaw and incorporating a 900,000-litre water tank, is termed “a highly technical building” and has, in one hit, expanded the production facility on the 6.4-hectare site on Melbourne’s doorstep by 60 per cent.
But, says DSM chief executive Antony Tulloch, the increased capacity that is so attractive for larger-scale film and TV productions – such as the pending reboot of Fritz Lang’s classic film Metropolis – is also delivering increased pressure.
He says the demand for content is increasing across Australia’s and the world’s studio complexes due to the proliferation of streaming services, and the new problem is how to accommodate new projects.
“Studio space is under pressure globally,” Tulloch says. “The UK is in the process of massive expansion and development, and is attracting private equity that previously was more interested in shopping centres and investments like that.”
DSM, which began being developed in 2004, is one of the three big Australian-based studios. The other two are the Gold Coast’s Village Roadshow Studios, which has nine stages and three water tanks, and Fox Studios Australia, which has nine sound stages in Sydney.
Although Docklands Studios is boasting that its new building with the pink facade branding now stands as “one of the largest” in the southern hemisphere, with “super Stage 6” having 3700 square metres of internal space, in Australia, it’s starting to look like a case of “mine is larger than yours” because Fox’s Stage 7 is a shade bigger with a volume of 3960 square metres.
Tulloch says any idea of the different studios being in competition “is kind of a joke because we don’t treat Fox or Roadshow as our competitors … we collaborate with them”.
In any case, those studio complexes are just as busy, and Tulloch says that, even before Dockland’s new building with its 17-metre-high gantry came into existence, “Melbourne was punching well above its weight; but now we can compete more equitably”.
Stage 6 has a few extras to offer in that it comes with the 4.5-metre-deep water tank for underwater or surface filming, and an attached three-level office building with pink louvres to moderate natural glare and solar gain.
One incoming productions due to begin filming shortly is the Robbie Williams biopic, Better Man, in which Williams is expected to play himself.
The sound stage, a beefy structure that required 600 tonnes of steel to create what Grimshaw describes as “a simple barrel form”, also needed fabulous acoustics and to be highly flexible so it can cater for the myriad different sets that will be mounted within it over coming years.
This final big build on the movie lot just about brings DSM to site capacity and, Tulloch says, “we now need to look at how we can develop better craft space”.
What he means is the “back of house” amenities that enable set building, wardrobe and make-up, and other office capacities.
In a short time there may be a need to find or develop ancillary facilities at other sites because “with four different productions on site” it is very definitely “a big player in a big Australian industry”.
That being so, does it yet have a moniker, like a “Bollywood” or similar label?
With some amusement but dismissing the idea out of hand “because it just doesn’t sound good”, Tulloch says some wits have offered “Mollywood”.
