Aardman celebrate a great week for animation

It’s been a great week for Aardman Animations. On the same day they launched their latest animation, 'The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists', the Chancellor gave them a nod in the House of Commons - the type of publicity money can’t buy. “Keep Wallace and Gromit exactly where they are” George Osborne proclaimed in his budget address, as he promised tax breaks for animation and TV companies. It also meant a cheap joke at Ed Miliband’s expense - the Labour leader is nicknamed Wallace by Tories and political cartoonists.

The Bristol based company have also got Hugh Grant to step away from the rom coms and walk the plank with them at the film’s premiere in London. He plays Pirate Captain, a brash and blustering leader, supported by a bunch of hapless misfits. The film is based around his attempts to secure the Pirate of the Year title.

More used to playing the charming Englishman, I asked Hugh how he channeled his inner pirate in this swashbuckling adventure.

It helped a lot looking at him, the beard, his vanity, his big eyes, big chest and he doesn't look very bright. So he became not very bright. I always imagined he was the youngest son of a posh family who fancied being a pirate

Standing in his way though is a Pirate hating Queen Victoria and Charles Darwin. Peter Lord, the co-founder of Ardman told me this was a “schoolboy’s vision of the past":

This Sunday Bristol will have it’s own premiere of the film at Cabot Circus Shopping Centre. The film opens in UK cinemas on March 28th. Film clip courtesy of Aardman Animations/Sony Pictures:

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