Factory pulls the strings on new puppet animation show Newzoids for ITV
From foul-mouthed Prince George to alley cat Katie Hopkins, no one is safe in the new topical animation sketch show from Factory and Citrus Television for ITV.
After working on a pilot with Spitting Image’s Giles Pilbrow, Phil Chalk of Factory had ITV sold on the puppet animation that takes aim at celebrities like Kim Kardashian, Ant and Dec and Kate Moss and politicians such as David Cameron, Nicola Sturgeon and my personal favourite, Ed Miliband.
The first episode, which saw Brian Cox’s puppet commentate whilst a moon orbited Kim K’s bottom, clocked up an impressive 3.7 million viewers in its primetime ITV slot!
The success of the show caught the attention of the business press with Phil Chalk named Small Business Person of The Week in the Independent, a two page interview feature in Greater Manchester Business Week and The Times came to the studios to shadow lead puppeteer Tim Jones on set for the At The Coal Face feature.
With Newzoids on air and Clangers and Scream Street in production, the future holds bright for Factory!
Katy x
Maxine Peake as Hamlet
As huge fans of Maxine Peake, the Royal Exchange AND Hamlet, we are delighted to be leading the publicity campaign for Maxine Peake as Hamlet, filmed at the Royal Exchange Theatre, and distributed by Picturehouse, which will be showing in 300 cinemas across the country from 23rd March.
The Telegraph Online exclusively revealed the trailer on Friday, and today the Guardian ran an exclusive interview with Maxine abut the role, her interpretation of the character and the feminist shift in theatre today.
With follow up coverage on the Independent and Red Online, this is a taste of the full campaign to be revealed in the coming weeks. Watch this space!
Fiona x
Life of Ryan
In a befitting warm up to Sports Personality of the Year 2015, Sundae led the PR campaign for the DVD release of Life of Ryan, the cinematic documentary celebrating Ryan Giggs’ illustrious career at Manchester United. With special appearances from Class of ’92 players like David Beckham, you really don’t have to be a football fan to enjoy this one!
Distributed by Universal Pictures, the film celebrates the beautiful game and gives Giggsy fans a sneak peak into the man behind the football. In light of the Red Devils’ post-Ferguson travails, the entertainment and sporting press were hooked from the outset.
Soccer AM were the first to exclusively broadcast the brand new trailer to 500,000 viewers on Sky Sports, followed by Mirror Online. These initial pieces sparked a buzz, with further coverage secured in Mail Online, Digital Spy, Manchester Evening News and Sky Sports.
Sundae also led the Life of Ryan press junket and, tasked with three hours of Ryan’s time, we arranged and managed 10 broadcast, print and online interviews with key titles including Sky Sports, Telegraph, Manchester Evening News, ITV Granada, BT Sport, Radio 5Live, TalkSport, Press Association and Match of The Day Magazine and Kickabout.
The junket resulted in blanket next day coverage with significant mentions for the DVD in The Independent, Yahoo, Daily Mirror online, Express online, Sport.co.uk and Mail Online to name a few.
With film reviews including Total Film, The Sun, Daily Star and the Sport Review, the tribute to the unique footballer was celebrated amongst audiences and fans alike, all on the Manchester United Stalwart’s 41st birthday!
Katy x
Strange Hill High hopes…
Strange Hill High is the brand new animated series from CBBC, FME and Altrincham’s Factory Transmedia.
Using a brand new form of animation, invented specifically for the show by Kat Van Henderson, the show is a wonderful mix of Japanese vinyl puppetry, CGI and just a little stop motion, which essentially adds to produce something magical that neither kids nor their parents have never seen the like of before.
The incredible looking show launched last week at the spookily pristine Ordsall Hall, which we found lurking quietly in the middle of Salford, as if it knew it would be needed just for this.
Showrunner Josh Weinstein flew into Manchester especially for the occasion on a particularly dreary Wednesday in May. Fortunately it transpires that he absolutely loves bad weather, which I can only put down to it being a novelty when you live in L.A.
Reactions to the show have so far been exactly as we hoped. It’s a charming, witty, dual level comedy animation of the incredibly high standard you’d expect from the showrunner behind The Simpsons and Futurama. It’s fabulous that it’s commissioned out of Salford and made in Altrincham and I have everything crossed that from its launch on Wednesday 8th May it will fast become the hit show it deserves to be.
As big as The Simpsons? You just never know….