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Production starts in Adelaide on Windmill Pictures’ first TV series Beep and Mort for ABC Kids
30 September 2021
Windmill Pictures is thrilled to announced its first television series, Beep and Mort, is now in production with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and Screen Australia.
Based on Windmill Theatre Company’s award-winning theatre show, Beep , the mixed media series for ABC Kids is also funded by the South Australian Film Corporation (SAFC).
Premier of South Australia Steven Marshall says, “Windmill has carved out a global reputation as a leading producer of live theatre for family audiences. It is incredibly exciting to see this local company innovating on its model to leverage their stories onto our screens, and I’m thrilled we have a brand-new children’s series being shot here in studio at the ABC in Adelaide.”
Created for pre-school audiences and their families, Beep and Mort tells the story of two best friends from different worlds, solving their daily dilemmas and unexpected challenges through invention, play and adventure. Beep and Mort explores the ways the organic and the technological can work together and, at its heart, is a series about empathy, community, and the enduring value of friendship.
Head of ABC Children’s Content Libbie Doherty says, “From the minute Windmill pitched the series to us, we immediately fell in love with these two new preschool stars – the unique and incredibly cute Beep and Mort. We are thrilled to be working in Adelaide with Kaye, Rose and the creative team who have created a beautifully warm and wholly original world, including a 6m set! Designed for the youngest ABC audience this whimsical series will gently ignite their minds and warm their hearts.”
Screen Australia’s Head of Content Sally Caplan said, “We’re proud to support this incredibly talented creative team, including Rosemary Myers’ first foray into television, bring this highly original project to life. Beep and Mort is a charming series exploring themes of self-discovery and the enduring value of friendship, and it is set to delight pre-schoolers and their families on ABC.”
Director Rosemary Myers says, “Throughout the creative development of this series, we have drawn on our theatrical roots but also integrated new technologies. The result is a contemporary hybrid form of puppetry that blends hand and rod puppets with post animated object puppets. In a screen landscape dominated by animation, we want to create a textured, built world that children feel they can almost step into and walk around in.”
Designed by Jonathon Oxlade, who worked with Rosemary Myers on the 2016 film Girl Asleep and several Windmill live shows including the recent stage adaptation of Bluey, Beep and Mort is written by an award-winning team featuring Charlotte Rose Hamlyn (The Wild Adventures of Blinky Bill), Simon Butters (H20: Just Add Water), Amy Stewart (The Heights) Hunter Page-Lochard (Cleverman), Wendy Hanna (Love Child, Giggle and Hoot) and Lorin Clarke (Larry the Wonderpup).
Producer Kaye Weeks says, “We’re thrilled to be making this show for our much-loved ABC, and it’s a realisation of our aspiration to take Windmill’s signature style out into the world through the television medium. We have a wealth of creative talent residing in this state in the theatre and screen sectors and we’ll be drawing on both to make this series.”
SAFC CEO Kate Croser says, “The SAFC is proud to support Windmill Pictures in producing their first TV series Beep and Mort, which will also be the first studio program for children made in South Australia for over a decade. With a majority South Australian cast and crew, this highly original new series will provide employment opportunities for South Australian specialist workers, and we’re particularly excited that the series will provide valuable first television credits for many of the key creative team, boosting the pool of credited South Australian writers, directors and producers.”
Beep and Mort will premiere on ABC Kids in late 2022.