‘Red Rock’ tops list of Sound and Vision scheme grants

TV3's soap opera Red Rock has been awarded public funding of €700,000 as part of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland's latest round of grants under the Sound and Vision scheme.

The 80-episode per year soap, which is made for TV3 by Element Pictures and Company Pictures, previously received a grant of €800,000 to get the production up and running.

Other large awards published as part of a total funding round of €5.2 million include Jive, a three-part Irish language drama that will be made for TG4 by Wildfire Films. The series "follows one woman's efforts to eliminate her husband with the help of an old flame".

Belfast-based Paper Owl Films (the new name for Indee Productions) received €300,000 to make Pablo, an RTÉjr cartoon about a young boy on the autism spectrum. Another animation company, Jam Media, was also awarded €300,000 to make its series Little Roy.

A grant of €300,000 is also being made to Zanzibar Films for its production of Sanctuary, a feature film based on Christian O'Reilly's stage play. It has also received support from the Irish Film Board, will be broadcast on RTÉ One.

The Sound and Vision scheme is financed from the Broadcast Fund, which is assigned 7 per cent of television licence fee receipts.

In this funding round, some €4.37 million has been allocated to 26 television projects, while 88 radio projects - including 11 radio dramas - will share funding of €465,000.

Some 277 applications were made in the round, with total funds sought arriving at €23.5 million.

“While we continue to be over-subscribed in each round, the BAI is very pleased to be in a position to increase the overall allocation in 2015 from €9.5 million to €10.3 million,” said BAI chief executive Michael O’Keeffe.

“The projects being supported will enhance radio and television schedules at national, local and community level and will, I believe, make a significant contribution to the quality of content that is available for Irish audiences,” he said.