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When it comes to The Wog Boy, Frank Lotito has enjoyed a progression from stage to screen.

The Melbourne actor turned director went from joining Nick Giannopoulos, Vince Colosimo, and Alex Dimitriades in The Wogboys Live tour of 2015 to being behind the camera for the upcoming third instalment of the film franchise.

Slated for release early next year, Wog Boys Forever signals the return of Steve Karamitsis (Giannopoulos), who is working as a taxi driver and still single. His life takes a turn when he becomes the target of a revenge plan hatched by Brianna Beagle-Thorpe (Annabel Marshall-Roth), the Minister for Immigration, and her brother (Liam Seymour), who blame him for destroying their mother Raelene’s political career.

Vince Colosimo reprises his role as Frank Di Benedetto in the film, which is written and produced by Giannopoulos.

Lotito, who is long-time friends with Colosimo, said he was invited to work...

Screen Australia is handing back the rights to 1,200 films to the producers, effective July 1.

The concession applies to films funded by the Film Finance Corp., the Australian Film Commission and during Screen Australia.s first year.

Titles include Muriel.s Wedding, The Adventures of Priscilla: Queen of the Desert and Strictly Ballroom, which are among the handful of films which fully recouped their Ffc investment. The others that recouped. are Green Card (an Australian/French co-production), Napoleon, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Shine, Sirens, The Wog Boy and Wolf Creek.

In the Afc era Caddie and Picnic at Hanging Rock were among the profitable pictures.

Screen Producers Australia CEO Matt Deaner welcomed the move, telling If, "This is good news for producers developing sustainable businesses, the key to which is to retain and manage the rights in their work. When we empower small businesses to capitalise on their creative endeavours there is only...

It.s not surprising that comedic actor Ed Kavalee.s debut telemovie Scumbus is about to hit screens. What is surprising is that he used his life savings to self-fund the project, which was strong enough to attract come of the biggest names in Australian comedy including Glenn Robbins, Tony Martin, Peter Helliar and Dave Hughes.

.What do they tell you not to do? Don.t put your own money in,. Kavalee says. .But I didn.t have a choice . what am I going to do? Ring up a funding body and say I have this idea for a comedy telemovie? They would have hung up straight away. You know you get to this point where you say .I.ve got to do something.....

Kavalee has been winning fans over the past six years on radio and as a host and performer on TV shows such Thank God You.re Here; TV Burp; Santo,...

It.s not surprising that comedic actor Ed Kavalee.s debut telemovie Scumbus is about to hit screens. What is surprising is that he used his life savings to self-fund the project, which was strong enough to attract come of the biggest names in Australian comedy including Glenn Robbins, Tony Martin, Peter Helliar and Dave Hughes.

.What do they tell you not to do? Don.t put your own money in,. Kavalee says. .But I didn.t have a choice . what am I going to do? Ring up a funding body and say I have this idea for a comedy telemovie? They would have hung up straight away. You know you get to this point where you say .I.ve got to do something.....

Kavalee has been winning fans over the past six years on radio and as a host and performer on TV shows such Thank God You.re Here,...

Big Mamma’s Boy’s Matteo Bruno and Franco Di Chiera had the challenge of marketing a rom-com set in Melbourne’s Italian community two ways, to the cultural minority and the mass majority. Colin Delaney reports.

“For me it’s a romantic comedy and that’s it,” says Franco Di Chiera, director of Big Mamma’s Boy about an Italian-Australian career man by day, jazz singer by night who falls for a non-Italian girl, while still living with his mother.

Yet, despite the fact the film is a rom-com at heart, Di Chiera, producer Matteo Bruno and lead actor/writer Frank Lotito are well aware Big Mamma’s Boy could easily be passed off as another Australian ‘wog story’.

And what would be wrong with that? Comedies about the ‘wog’, be them Italian, Greek or any other wonderful ethnicity slapped with that all-encompassing title have been widely successful across...

After more than a decade of anticipation, the most popular Australian comedy of all time*, The Castle, will be released on UK shores on DVD from 25th July 2011 by Paramount Home Entertainment.

Starring Eric Bana and Michael Caton, this iconic Australian comedy tells the story of the typical Aussie “battler”. Despite living at the end of the airport runway, the Kerrigan family has always loved their home. But when the airport announces plans to expand, the Kerrigan’s find themselves in the ultimate David vs Goliath battle. Led by Darryl Kerrigan, the father of the family, The Castle is a hilarious story of how a man’s home really is his castle.

Led by popular Australian actors Michael Caton (The Animal) and Stephen Curry (The Wog Boy, Nugget), The Castle has become well known as the film which launched Eric Bana’s career (Black Hawk Down, Troy, Hulk). Playing the family’s son in law,...

The Kings of Mykonos: Wog Boy 2 has opened at number two of the Australian box office with $1,828,902.

Distributors Paramount/Transmission announced that the film’s opening is currently the highest for an Australian film this year, ahead of Bran Nue Dae’s $1,611,000.

The sequel opened with 203 screens (average $9,009).

According to Transmission MD Richard Payten, the result is pleasing because it shows that “there is a real appetite for Australian mainstream comedies. Nick and his team know their audience so well and have proven that for a second time.”

The Kings of Mykonos is the sequel to Nick Giannopoulos’ 2000 film The Wog Boy, which made more than $11m at the box office. It was directed by Peter Andrikidis and produced by Giannopoulos himself, with See-Saw Films’ Emil Sherman.

The number one film was once again Riddley Scott’s Robin Hood (Universal), starring Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett.

The romantic comedy I Love You Too...

When you have an $11.4m comedy in your hands, a sequel is a no-brainer, even if it takes 10 years to make it happen. Miguel Gonzalez met with the creators of The Kings of Mykonos and discussed why ‘ethnic’ content is the secret to domestic and international success.

Five years ago actor/writer/producer Nick Giannopoulos started developing a story about a couple of Australians with a Mediterranean background going back to their ancestral homeland for the first time, only to discover that it is no longer the same place their parents left, and that they are, in fact, more Australian than they ever thought they were.

“It’s an Australian fish-out-of-the-water comedy, shot in Greece yet uniquely Australian. That’s why Crocodile Dundee worked; these are western suburbs Melbourne boys plonked into the middle of one of the most cosmopolitan islands in the world, with their thongs and broad Australian accents,...

Romantic comedies make money. Lots of it. So why isn’t Australia making more? Miguel Gonzalez spoke with the creators of I Love You Too, a comedy that will help fill that gap in the film market.

I Love You Too is comedian Peter Helliar’s big screen debut, produced by Princess Pictures’ Laura Waters (We Can Be Heroes, Summer Heights High) and Yael Bergman (Love and Other Catastrophes).

Helliar had worked with Waters in the pilot episode for Rove in 1999 and kept in touch with the producer.

Knowing he had a number of ideas for features, in 2002 Waters asked Helliar to choose one and start working on it. Due to other commitments, it took a while before that idea became a treatment and, finally, a film script.

According to Waters, the message that drove Helliar to write the story and guided every draft was “tell people that you love them”, and from that premise,...

Alex Dimitriades has rushed home to Australia from a Greek film set to be with his family after the death of his mother. The Aussie actor, who has had roles in hit shows such as Neighbours, Underbelly and Heartbreak High, was apparently devoted to mother Betty, who had been suffering for a long time from an unspecified illness. Dimitriades was filming The Wog Boy sequel The (more)...

The follow-up to the hugely successful 2000 film, The Wog Boy directed by Aleski Vellis is getting a sequel titled Wog Boy 2: The Kings of Mykonos which is set to begin filming in September. The sequel is to be directed by TV vet Peter Andrikidis, who by his surname alone would know a thing or two about being a wog.   Nick Giannopoulos, who seems to have been on cinema hiatus since his last film (and directorial debut) The Wannabes back in 2003, will reprise his role as Steve Karamitsis alongside Vince Colosimo (Body of Lies, Underbelly) who plays Frank.

Cezary Skubiszewski: composer, conductor, musician. Most people wouldn't recognise the name, but if you saw him walking down the street in a tux you are almost guaranteed to recognise the face, especially if he happened to have an ice cold Vb in hand. Yes, this great Australian composer was the conductor for the Vb Stubby Orchestra.   Thankfully though, that won't be his only entry in the history books. Cezary is responsible for scoring some of Australia's most memorable films - Two Hands, Book of Revelation, Bootmen, The Wog Boy - not to mention television series such as the touching mini-series After the Deluge.

SYDNEY -- Hugo Weaving and Rose Byrne have signed on to Australian feature The Tender Hook, which starts shooting next week in Melbourne, production shingle Mandala Films said Tuesday.

Billed as a contemporary film noir set in Sydney in the 1920's, the production will be helmed by writer-director Jonathan Ogilvie.

The story centers around Byrne's character and her involvement in a love triangle that includes her English lover, played by Weaving, and a young boxer played by Matt Le Nevez.

The film is being produced by Michelle Harrison and John Brousek of Mandala Films, who previously collaborated on the 2000 comedy hit The Wog Boy.

Financed by the Film Finance Corporation Australia and U.K.-based Parkland Pictures with support from Film Victoria, Tender Hook is scheduled for release in 2008. Parkland will handle International sales, with Dendy Films distributing in Australasia.

SYDNEY -- Despite the success of a handful of Australian films at the local boxoffice last year, the majority of local releases face the "harsh realities" of struggling to get distribution and then having to compete in a crowded theatrical market, according the annual report of the Film Finance Corp. Australia. A cap on available FFC funding for features also potentially will hinder the film industry's growth, the country's principal production investment agency noted. In the financial year ending June 30, the FFC invested AUS$55.5 million ($30.5 million) in 54 film and TV projects with total budgets of AUS$108.3 million ($60 million). In the previous year it invested AUS$62 million in 48 projects worth AUS$131 million. Recoupments from its investments rose to AUS$14.2 million ($7.8 million) from AUS$12.4 million thanks to previous boxoffice hits such as Chopper and The Wog Boy.