Oscar-nominated producer Magic Light Pictures (The Gruffalo, Room on the Broom, Revolting Rhymes) is ready to introduce the world to the animated stars of The Smeds and the Smoos, the studio’s latest adaptation of a book by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler.
The intergalactic adventure is set on a world where the red Smeds and blue Smoos must learn to overcome their differences and work together to find Janet and Bill, a young couple who have eloped to escape longstanding family rivalries.
Featuring Adjoa Andoh as Grandmother Smoo, Bill Bailey as Grandfather Smed, Rob Brydon as Uncle Smoo, Daniel Ezra as Bill, Sally Hawkins as Narrator, Ashna Rabheru as Janet and Meera Syal as Aunt Smed, the half-hour film is due to premiere on BBC One (U.K.) at Christmas, and will stream on iPlayer.
“There’s just the sort of ignorant prejudice that people can harbor about each other until they come together and actually love and that survival and kinship are the things that bind all of us,” commented Andoh. “Grandma Smoo, utterly capable, she can drive a rocket, she can clump about the place, she can blow her trumpet, delight in her kids and her grandkids and she can hate with a passion as well. Grandma Smoo’s not a woman of mild tastes, everything’s fairly strong with her. So when she’s your implacable enemy, she’s implacably your enemy. But you could change her mind at any moment and then she will love you to death.”
” I think the main themes of the film are that we should just accept differences in others. I think the thing I get from it is that the older generation tend to be more resistant to change. And actually, sometimes it takes the younger generation to sort of breach that divide,” added Bailey. “Grandpa Smed, he’s the kind of patriarch of the Smed family, and he’s very much the kind of protector of the family, and he’s in charge. And he’s quite sort of traditional, and a bit stuck in his ways. And he’s sort of a little bit of a stick in the mud, really, but he’s kind. He’s not an ogre. He’s a kindly old grandpa who cares about his family, I think that’s the best way to describe him.”
