BBC ANIMATION LAUNCH NEW SERIES

BBC MEDIAARC, BBC Resources’ newly established design, interactive and animation division, have won a multi-million pound, 39 programme commission to produce animated characters for CBBC’s new adventure series ‘Friends and Heroes’, due to begin broadcasting in October 2002.
BBC MediaArc’s CharacterShop, a state-of-the-art animation studio based in Birmingham, have teamed up with Brian Brown, originator and series executive producer of the ITV kids hit, ‘StoryKeepers’, to produce the series.
The entire trilogy will be delivered by the Autumn of 2004 and the first series is scheduled for broadcast by CBBC from October 2002. It will be available to other broadcasters and for video distribution by Autumn 2002.
The three 13 part series which have been conceived and written by Brown are aimed at a general children’s audience. The trilogy has three different sets of characters, set in different locations at different times at different times during the period AD 68 to 73. They revolve around the exciting and often hilarious adventures of groups of Jewish and Christian children and young people, dodging the persecuting Roman authorities during the early days of the Christian era.
ZDF Children’s and the Hallmark Channel have lined up behind the project and there is wide interest in video, publishing and internet content.
Producer of ‘Star Wars’ and ‘The Empire Strikes Back’, Gary Kurtz, is the consultant to BBC MediaArc. He will work with in-house Animation Director Russell Tagg and Art Director Richard Allport who head up the BBC MediaArc creative team.
Brown said: “I am delighted that BBC MediaArc have won the ‘Friends and Heroes’ commission. I am equally delighted that they chose the Annecy International Animation Festival to complete the project.” (CD)