Simon Target

Simon Target (born January 1962) is a British/Australian film-maker. He is best known for a series of self-filmed television documentaries he made for The Australian Broadcasting Corporation which include King's School (on The King's School, Sydney),^[1] Flight for Life (about the Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia), The Academy (on the Australian Defence Force Academy),^[2] and Rough Justice (about the legal profession).^[3] Uni, his study of a group of dissolute arts students at Sydney University, featured Charles Firth, Craig Reucassel and Andrew Hansen, who formed the comedy group The Chaser. Hansen later satirised Target in CNNNN, where he played the network's British correspondent who was also called Simon Target.

Target wrote and directed the feature film Backsliding, starring Tim Roth, with an original score by Australian composer Nigel Westlake, and the TV series Operatunity Oz - a nationwide talent search to find an ‘undiscovered’ opera singer. Target has also directed live opera^[4] for the stage in England and the USA, with artists such as Simon Keenlyside, Simon Russell Beale and conductor Andrew Parrott.

Other work includes TV series with Donna Hay, Curtis Stone, Ben O'Donoghue, Kylie Kwong, Ainsley Harriot and Rick Stein. In 2010 he wrote and directed the natural history series Penguin Island, with Rolf Harris for BBC Television. The series won Target prizes for best script and best direction at science/environmental film festivals in China^[5] and Germany,^[6] and the Grand Prix in Banska Bystrica, Slovenia.^[7]

Target was born in the United Kingdom. Educated at Westminster School, London, where he starred in a BBC television documentary about the school directed by Jonathan Gili, then read Music and English at Trinity College, Cambridge. He attended Britain’s National Film and Television School making his first films with fellow students Molly Dineen, Michael Caton Jones, Nick Park and Mark Herman. He lives in Sydney, Australia and is married to Polish doctor Beata Zatorska with whom he co-wrote a book about Poland Rose Petal Jam - Recipes and Stories from a Summer in Poland,^[8] published by Tabula Books, winner of the 2012 Gourmand Award.^[9]

Target has since made film profiles of artist Tim Storrier, theatre director Simon Stone and a feature length documentary about Poland's Jewish past and future called 'A Town called Brzostek'.

References

External links

• The Academy - official web site
• Simon Target at the Internet Movie Database (incomplete)
• Opera Australia
• Rose Petal Jam at Tabula Books