Writer/Director Samuel Layton Door will be presenting his animated sitcom Willie at the Annessy Animation Festival and Market next week as part of Australia’s first delegation.
Produced by Ludo Studio and Mad Ones, the series is currently in development and will be proposed to international buyers by Layton Door and producers, accompanied by a proof-of-concept trailer released today.
Willie is a returnable 2D animation series created by Layton Door and his husband, production designer Bradley Tennant.
Set on a smartphone in front of the pre-Queensland smartphone, the series follows Wilbur “Willie” Davis, a teenager who works on sexuality, religion and masculinity while growing up on a struggling banana farm. With only a few inappropriate school peers, Willie flees into a colorful inner world inhabited by the imaginary friends of the neurotic cast, voiced in pitch trailers of Judith Lucy, Reuben Kay, Daniel Walker and Anne Edmonds.
They include Beverly Leslie. Beverly Leslie is a gross middle-aged gay man trapped in the body of a molter (Kay). An overly opinionated portrait of the Virgin Mary (Lucy). And the little bronze man (including the large Napoleon complex) was pasted onto one of his father’s old soccer trophies. Each of these misguided mentors speak to Willie’s ongoing inner conflict.
Willie is produced by Liam Hayen with development producer Chloe Hume and executives produced by Daily Pearson, Charlie Aspinwall and Cena Strachan. Screen Australia supported the project with development funding earlier this year.
Layton Door is a visual artist and author, and the book includes how to become a big, strong man, and it’s all a lot. His interdisciplinary style of ceramics, painting, sculpture and animation throughout makes the series’ art direction known.
He and Tennant ran through Sad Man Studio and are passionate about bringing Arctic Queensland to life through the world of 2D animation, and the tenant grew up in a real sugar cane farming town.
“To tackling the concept of Willie-proof in Ludo Studio and Mad Ones movies is like relating to adolescence. It’s fun, challenging, exciting, vulnerable and ultimately a bit horny,” they said in a joint statement.
“We wrote these characters with Judith Lucy, Anne Edmonds, Daniel Walker and Reuben Kay in mind, so bringing their voices back to life was the highlight of our story.
Layton Door and producers travel to Annessy with support from Screen Queensland.
