Following Sky’s successful Up Next showcase event at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London last night (May 17), where the broadcaster unveiled an exciting slate of programming to a star-studded line up of British talent, it has released first-look trailers for seven of its upcoming original British series.
These series sit among over 200 Sky Original shows across all genres this year – a 60% increase from 2021 and testament to Sky’s investment in the U.K. creative economy.
Of course, the stand-out title of the batch for Animation Magazine is the highly anticipated CGI-animated feature, The Amazing Maurice!
A lively animated adventure based on one of Sir Terry Pratchett’s wildly popular Discworld novels starring Hugh Laurie (Avenue 5), Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones), David Thewlis (Wonder Woman), Himesh Patel (Yesterday), Gemma Arterton (The King’s Man) and Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey).
Synopsis: Maurice is a streetwise ginger cat who masterminds a money-making scam by befriending a group of talking rats and a human boy, Keith. Going town to town, the rats pretend to infest the town and Keith uses his pipe to lead them away – all for a tidy profit. However, as Maurice and the rodents reach the stricken town of Bad Blintz, they discover something sinister going down beneath the city’s streets.
The Amazing Maurice is directed by Toby Genkel (Yakari: A Spectacular Journey, All Creatures Big and Small) from a script by Terry Rossio (Aladdin, Shrek). The animation is produced by Germany’s Ulysses Filmproduktion (producer: Emely Christians) and co-produced by U.K.’s Cantilever Media (producers: Andrew Baker and Robert Chandler), with additional animation provided by Sheffield-based studio Red Star 3D.
The film was sneak-peeked at Cartoon Movie earlier this year.
