Aardman is developing more stories set in the world of Robin Robin

Dan Ojari and Mikey Pries, co-writers and co-directors of Aardman Animations’ musical film Robin Robin, which premiered on Netflix in November 2021 and was nominated for an Oscar the following year, have announced that the spinoff will be He said it was planned. card.

“We are currently developing more stories in the Robin, Robin world,” Preece said. variety. “I think that’s all we can say. But it’s definitely our hopes and dreams. We want to do more because we feel there are still so many stories to tell in this world.” Masu.”

Featuring a voice cast including Bronte Carmichael, Adeel Akhtar, Gillian Anderson, and Richard E. Grant, Robin Robin follows a robin who is raised by a loving family of thieving rats. As Robin grows up, her differences become more apparent. She tries to pull off her daring heist to prove to her family that she really is a good mouse.

Ojali and Please are talking variety It was held at Aardman’s headquarters on Spike Island in the western UK city of Bristol, as part of a three-part series on the company’s young talent. Other rising stars include Matthew Walker, creator and series director of “Loid of the Flies,” Jane Davis, co-director and audio director of “Loid of the Flies,” and creator and voice director of “The Very Small Creatures.” Includes director Lucy Izzard. ”

Founded by Peter Lord and David Sproxton, Aardman is best known for its Wallace and Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and Chicken Run series. The company has won four Oscars and been nominated nine more times. Its latest feature film, Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget, was released on Netflix last month, and a new Wallace and Gromit movie, directed by Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, is in production and is expected to be released on Netflix later this year. scheduled. .

Ojali and Pries say they felt Aardman’s influence early in their lives. “One thing we both have in common is that we grew up on Aardman’s diet,” Pries says. “I used to come here to do stop-motion workshops with clay when I was eight years old, and we both saw ‘The Wrong Television’ for the first time and watched the magic happen. And those formative moments really stuck with us, and eventually we both went on to create our own stop motion films. So when the opportunity came to come here and actually build something at scale, it was a no-brainer.”

The two met at Wimbledon College of Art in London, where Ojali studied set design and Pries majored in technical art and special effects, although they also made short animated films during their studies. They continued their studies at London’s prestigious Royal College of Art. Ojali’s 2011 graduate film, “Slow Derek,” toured more than 40 of her film festivals, including London and Sundance. Please’s graduate film, The Eagleman Stag, premiered at Sundance in 2011, won a special award at the Annecy Animation Film Festival, won a BAFTA, and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. His second short film ‘Marilyn Myller’ premiered at his 2013 Sundance and won Best Short Film at the British Animation Awards.

In 2014, he founded Parabella Studio in Hoxton, a shabby-chic London neighborhood known as a creative hub for artists. The frosted glass front door has the words “Parabella Studios” written on it in the style of a detective agency. Here they worked on short stories, identities and commercials. The Great British Bake Off reboot trailer for the 2017 season won a Cannes Lion Silver Award for Filmcraft in Animation. He is the director of the cartoon network series “Elliot from Earth,” which premiered in 2021.

It was at Parabella that the idea for “Robin Robin” was born. “It took quite a while to develop,” Ojali explains. “A few days later we came in and said, ‘What do you think of this idea?’ And there was a kind of slate taped to the wall with 10 different ideas in various stages of development. Of those, he moved forward with three cases. The comic book “Deadlock” (unpublished), the TV series pilot “Alan the Infinite” (watch the trailer here), and “Robin Robin.” “It started as an idea for a bird raised by a few mice, a Christmas thing with few materials, and then we put it together almost overnight and turned it into a one-pager. At that point it was like a therapy. It was a big deal,” Ojali says.

Please add more. “For three or four years, we told this story over and over again at Christmas parties to people who would listen, looking for the moment when their eyes looked dead and they wanted to walk away. Then we record that that part of the story wasn’t working. So we spent a long time developing the story in a very relaxed way.”

Mr. Ojali said that in their brief, the pair envisioned a film that would be “The Ugly Duckling” meets “The Jungle Book” in a Christmas story set in the English countryside. But since then, “The Ugly Duckling” is no longer mentioned. “Please” brought a different story to mind. “The parallel I drew was with ‘Pinocchio,’ because it’s the story of a person who wants to be something he’s not. And what I’ve always liked about Pinocchio is that he’s just the way he is. He’s great, so he shouldn’t turn into a real boy.” He added: “I think the reason Pinocchio was doing it was to fit in with the others. And in the end, he blends in and becomes just like everyone else, but I always felt he was a much better puppet.”

While developing the project, the two watched anxiously in case a similar project appeared on the scene. Ojali says: “Every year, I would hold my breath and think, “Is there something about robins? Because just a Christmas special based on Robin is enough for people to think, “Oh, that’s kind of similar.” Because I felt that.And then there was this ad [department store] It was about Marks and Spencer’s robin, and I was like, ‘Oh! ‘It was like, ”

The project survived, but no formal proposal was made for several years until June 2019, when I met Sarah Cox, head of development at Aardman, in Annecy. A crowded dining room. At that point, they had a cure, a script, a storybook with illustrations by Bryony Mae Smith, and song lyrics set to music by Ben Please and Beth Porter of the Bookshop Band. was. In a lively dining room in Annecy, they read a picture book with Cox and sang one of the songs to him – in the voice of the mischievous Magpie character. Shortly after, the project was pitched to Netflix with Aardman’s participation, and production began in January.

Ojali said one of the story’s elements is the contrast between the wild and dramatic lives of animals and birds and the domesticated world of humans. “It’s a contrast to them having a big adventure while we’re looking for crumbs.” [humans] I’m not aware of it at all,” Ojali said.

In the movie, humans are portrayed as somewhat threatening. “For rats, entering a human home is a Jack and the Beanstalk situation full of giant, otherworldly figures. “We have to do it,” Preece said.

Robin and his rat family must enter the human world to find food, and the spirit in which this is done evokes another fictional character, Robin Hood. However, the producers describe the family’s actions as “sneaking” rather than stealing. please explain: [Robin’s] The central problem is that she’s not very sneaky. She is a noisy, mischievous bird in a family of more delicate and sneaky rats. ”

The film has an element of slapstick, provided by the clumsy Robin. The request states: “Physical comedy was a very important aspect of this production, especially the character of Robin. Much of her frenetic, vulgar energy comes from Bronte Carmichael, who voiced Robin. She had a really great view of Robin, but it was pretty vulgar. She couldn’t keep her head still for more than two seconds, which made for an awkward birth.”

Ojali added that some of the slapstick elements came from improvisations provided by the storyboard artists, and that these would be incorporated into the script as the project progressed. The same was true for animators during the testing phase, Please says. “You might ask, why not try a little walk or dance, especially the sequence with the mouse on the fence post? You’ll come back with it, but it’s so rich that we had to find a way to squeeze those little moments into the show.”

You might think that people working at Aardman would be expected to follow the company’s aesthetic, but even in their choice of materials for their dolls, Ojali and Pries felt no pressure to follow the use of clay, instead opting for needle felting. Select and feel woolly creatures. “Early on, before we came up with the needle felt look, there were conversations about using Aardman’s clay aesthetic and going down that route. But we decided to try something different. I was excited,” Preece said.

Ojali added: “I had a great appetite here.” [for us to do something different] In the same way.i was assuming that [there would be pressure to adopt the company’s aesthetic]. Aardman has a very distinctive and well-known style.But the culture here and everywhere [the company] It’s very exploratory and creator-driven. A strange project that grows into something bigger. And what’s really great about being here is the culture of supporting creators with the characters and stories they create and trying to grow it into something for a broader audience, a family audience. And Netflix was also really keen to support and commit to the creators and the creative vision behind the project. That was great. ”

“But fortunately, I think there was a lot of natural alignment between the project we were developing and Aardman’s work. It has nothing to do with clay, but the underdog character. It has to do with weirdos and certain things on the frontier.”

Ojali observes that the film was infused with the personalities of Aardman’s wide range of staff, due to the influence of those who worked on the project. “It’s such a hard process to put a movie together that you don’t really think about it at the time, but you sit down afterwards and say, ‘Oh, this film is so great because of all the amazing people we’re working with. It’s injected with humor.”’ It took years to refine it. ”