Film and television director, actor and writer.
David Hannay entered the film industry in 1958 as an extras casting assistant on the Hecht Hill Lancaster production of Ray Lawler's Summer of the Seventeenth Doll (q.v.). Since 1967 he has been involved in the development, production and marketing of more than fifty film and television productions as producer and/or director. As a writer he worked on The Shadowed Mind (1988) with Cedric Sundstrom and Rufus Swart. He has also appeared in a number of films and television productions as an actor including You Can't See Round Corners (1967), The Battlers (1968), Alison's Mind (1981), The Shadowed Mind (1988) and Hildegarde (2001).
Hannay's television credits include two award winning television series, The Godfathers (q.v., 1971) and Number 96 (1974), three award winning telemovies, Is There Anybody There? (1975), Mama's Gone a Hunting (1975) The Alternative (1976); and the French/Australian co-produced TV movie Love in Ambush (1997). Other television series and TV movies include: The Spoiler (1972), Jesus Christ Superstar (1972), Kung Fu Killers (1974), The Lancaster Miller Affair (1990),
His feature film credits as producer include: Stone (1974); The Man from Hong Kong (1975), the award winning New Zealand feature Solo (1978), the World War II dramas Death of a Soldier (1986) and Emma's War (1986), Comrades (1988), Thomas Mogotlane's anti-apartheid and multi-award winning film Mapantsula (1988), Shotgun Wedding (1993), Gross Misconduct (1993), John Feldman's Dead Funny (1994), the UK/NZ co-production Savage Play (1995), and Richard Kuiper's feature documentary Stone Forever (1999). Since 2000 Hannay has produced the feature films: Cubbyhouse (2001) and Hildegarde (q.v., 2001).
During his career Hannay has worked with thirteen directors on their first feature films and at least as many first time writers and producers. His executive positions include Head of Production for Gemini Productions (q.v.) between 1970 and 1973 and again from 1975 to 1976. He was also General Manager of the Greater Union production subsidiary The Movie Company in 1974. Since 1977 Hannay has been an independent producer and Chairman of his own production company - David Hannay Productions.
Hannay has received numerous awards during his long career in the Australian film and television industries. Among these achievements are: The 1988 Human Rights Australia Film Award (for Mapantsula) and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Producers and Directors Guild of Australia (1996). He was also named Film Pioneer of the Year in 1996 by The Society of Australian Cinema Pioneers 'for outstanding service to the Motion Picture Industry'. He is the inaugural recipient of the Screen Producers Association 2002 Maura Fay Award 'for service to the industry'. In 2008 Hannay was awarded the Australian Screen Sound Guild's Syd Butterworth Lifetime Achievement Award, and the following year he was recognised with a Life Membership of the Screen Producers Association of Australia.
