08 - The Mouse Mill

Bagpuss is a 1974 UK children's television series, made by Peter Firmin and Oliver Postgate through their company Smallfilms. The title character is "an old, saggy cloth cat, baggy, and a bit loose at the seams". Although only 13 episodes of the show were made, it remains fondly remembered, and has often been repeated in the UK.

The programmes were made using stop-frame animation. Bagpuss is an actual cloth cat, but was not intended to be such an electric pink. "It should have been a ginger marmalade cat but the company in Folkestone dyeing the material made a mistake and it turned out pink and cream. It was the best thing that ever happened," said Firmin.[5]

Madeleine the rag doll was made by Firmin's wife, Joan, with an extra long dress to hold their children's nightdresses, but Postgate decided it would serve better as one of the characters.

Gabriel the Toad was the only character in the series who could move freely without the use of stop-frame animation. Scenes featuring him playing the banjo and singing would have taken quite a bit of time, so Peter Firmin created a mechanism that helped him control Gabriel through a hole in his can.

Bagpuss has now retired to the Rupert Bear Museum in Canterbury, UK (part of the Museum of Canterbury), together with other characters and Emily's shop window.

Most of the stories and songs used in the series are based on folk songs and fairy tales from around the world. The round sung by the mice (starting with the words "We will fix it...") is to the tune of "Sumer is icumen in", dating from the Middle Ages.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• stop
• frame
• animation
• animate
• bagpuss
• 1974
• 1970s
• uk
• childrens
• tv
• television
• peter
• firmin
• oliver
• postgate
• smallfilms
• old
• saggy
• cloth
• cat
• ranson
• branding
• brands
• matthew
• helen