Get ready for the return of TV’s most sinister penguin and a garden gnome that turns criminal when cheese-loving inventor Wallace and his long-suffering dog Gromit return for a new action-packed adventure in the BBC’s Vengeance Most Fowl.
Airing on Christmas Day on BBC One (see out Christmas TV guide for more shows to enjoy), it will be the pair’s first feature-length animation since The Curse of the Were-Rabbit in 2005 and sees Wallace’s latest invention, a smart-gnome called Norbot run amok when it’s hacked by his arch-enemy and criminal penguin, Feathers McGraw.
"It’s been great fun bringing Feathers back after 30 years," says Park when What to Watch meets him at BBC HQ for our chat. "He’s more menacing than ever and is currently in prison in the city zoo for the jewelry heist he masterminded in The Wrong Trousers."
Here Nick gives us the lowdown on what to expect....
What was the inspiration behind the story of Vengeance Most Fowl?
"I’d had the idea of garden gnomes turning bad for more than a decade but I could never work out what exactly made them bad. Then it occurred to me the question I get asked most from fans is 'Will Feathers McGraw ever return?'" says multi-award winning director, creator and writer Park. "I thought, 'What if Feathers was involved with these gnomes?’ So three decades on he’s back!"
You have a great cast of actors doing the voices. What can you tell us about them?
"Our key cast is Ben Whitehead as Wallace, Reece Shearsmith as Norbot, Peter Kay as Inspector Mackintosh, Lauren Patel (Everybody's Talking about Jamie) as Mackintosh’s assistant, PC Mukherjee and then there are lots of supporting roles. Muzz Khan (Brassic) is Anton Deck, the host of Up North News, Diane Morgan (Motherland) is a TV news reporter called Onya Doorstep and Adjoa Andoh (Bridgerton) is a judge. They are all fantastic! "
Nick says, "Lenny Henry very kindly agreed to just come in for a small cameo too. He plays a character called Mr Convenience. When the whole neighbourhood is admiring Norbot and saying how wonderful he is, Mr Convenience pops up to give his opinion."
This is the first feature-length film since Peter Sallis, who was the original voice of Wallace, passed away in 2017 isn't it?
"Yes, Peter was such a treasure and so amazing with what he brought to Wallace. It was very hard shoes for anyone to step into but Ben (Whitehead) was just a gift. He has brilliantly embodied the humor and the character that Peter established, but he’s been wonderful in making Wallace his own too. He’s a very funny and talented actor."
Which part of the production and filming process do you personally find most exciting?
"Almost every part of it. I love the storyboarding and coming up with the ideas, the writing and then designing the models and seeing them come to fruition. We are perfectionists so it can be a nerve-wracking process. As we’re making it we can go ‘Ok, this scene will be great when it’s edited, this scene will be great when the music is in, this scene will be great when the effects are in’. And then you slowly get to the point where it’s like, ‘Right, well this is actually it! We don’t have any more excuses!’"
Could you ever have imagined just what a global success Wallace and Gromit would become?
"I always knew when I was a young student working at college on A Grand Day Out that it was something special because I’d never seen anything like it before so I guess I had this quiet confidence but no, I could never have imagined it would be so huge on a global scale. It would be impossible to imagine that!"
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl airs on Christmas Day at 6.10pm on BBC One.
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