British stars Miriam Margolyes and Jim Carter are joining Wallace and Gromit for an extraordinary adventure in which the audience can conjure up the much-loved inventor and his faithful hound as avatars directly in front of them, wherever they happen to be.
The new story from Aardman Productions, titled The Big Fix Up, is described as a story-driven augmented reality adventure, rather than a film or a game, although there are elements of both. It will be available to viewers via an app on their mobile phone or tablet this autumn, with the camera in that device enabling digital versions of Wallace and Gromit to appear in front of viewers as the story unfolds.
Nick Park, the characters’ creator, joked that Wallace, as an inventor with a love of technology, “would embrace this wholeheartedly and give it the big thumbs-up”.
Merlin Crossingham, Aardman’s creative director of Wallace & Gromit, explained: “We’ve taken what we would call a real Wallace and Gromit in modelling clay, scanned them into the computer, and the very clever technology then renders them in real time with your mobile phone as avatars, whether you want them life-size or on your desktop.”
In the story, the duo pursue their latest business venture, Spick & Spanners, receiving “the contract of a lifetime – to ‘Fix Up’ Bristol”. Bafta-winning Margolyes will take the role of Beryl, “Spick & Spanner’s AI bot”, described as a “bustling guide and maternal presence … always happiest keeping the job orders and the tea flowing”. Carter will voice the character of Bernard Grubb, a pompous and devious puffed-pie magnate with “lofty political aspirations”. The character of Lily Hackerby is voiced by comedian and actor Isy Suttie.
Crossingham said: “Part of the story is that Grubb has employed Wallace to fix up Bristol, hoping he can bribe the electorate by doing everyone a favour. Of course, Wallace has no idea what he’s put himself into. That’s where the audience comes in. Because the job is too big, the audience are employed, and Wallace will give them jobs to do. For example, there’s been reports of robot pigeons in Bristol city centre. You’ll have fun chasing the pigeons. It’s very silly, as you’d expect with Wallace and Gromit.”
The Big Fix Up has been created by Aardman and Fictioneers, a consortium of British companies, with research support from the University of South Wales and funding from UK Research & Innovation.
