“I was thinking, this is a career highlight,” recalls Pavlovic. “I said to Trent, ‘I’ve got to stop you talking. I just have to tell you how much I love Boy Swallows Universe’. It was a very organic conversation about what I think lends itself to a theatrical adaptation.”

When Harper Collins got in touch to say the stage rights were now available, she adds: “We jumped right in – and here we are.”

There’s much work to be done before BSU hits the stage – so much work, in fact, that there isn’t even a timeline yet.

Dalton will be involved but will mostly leave it to others to bring their visions to his story. “I will be the cheerleader, and I will be reading every line, but I don’t want to be the writer,” he says. “It’s too close [to me] and I think I’d only slow things down.”

And if the team takes the story in directions Dalton hadn’t originally envisaged, will he be OK with that?

“Absolutely,” he says. “If it’s a direction that excites me and feels true to that kid [his fictional alter-ego, Eli Bell] at 12, I am open for anything, if not more excited about it.”

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One thing Pavlovic is certain about is that her Boy Swallows Universe will not be a musical. The other is that she wants to build something that will travel to the biggest stages around the world. “My interest in it is the humanity and, I believe, universality of the story.”

Global Creatures has had success exporting original Australian IP to the world’s biggest stages. Moulin Rouge!, adapted from Baz Luhrmann’s movie, won 10 Tony Awards on Broadway and an Olivier in London. Its 11 productions globally have amassed box office takings of $1.7 billion and counting, Pavlovic claims.

Over the past decade, Australian theatre more broadly has begun to make a serious impact internationally – think writer Suzie Miller (Prima Facie), director Kip Williams (The Picture of Dorian Gray), producer Michael Cassell (a powerhouse at home who has expanded to both Broadway and the West End). And Pavlovic is convinced that, with the right moves, there could be much more to come.

“We’re starting to get recognition internationally that we do have that kind of talent pool and are capable of developing that level of work,” she says.

But it’s expensive to develop for the world stage – King Kong, which Global Creatures developed in Sydney, debuted in Melbourne, and ultimately took to Broadway – represented a $33 million journey to its first opening night (and many millions more to retool it for its New York debut).

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Which is why Pavlovic has lent her voice to a campaign for a 40 per cent offset for the development of new works for theatre, similar to the one available to film producers.

“This is a once-in-a-generation moment,” she says. “It would be a tragedy for us to miss it because everything’s in place, and this could help catapult us that bit faster to where we really need to and can be. I think we are poised.”