Mattel and ‘Chicken Run’ Studio Aardman Team-Up on Stop-Motion, Animated ‘Pingu’ Series

Barbie giant Mattel is teaming up with award-winning animation studio Aardman (Chicken Run, Shaun the Sheep, Wallace & Gromit) to co-develop a new stop-motion, animated Pingu television series.

The series is inspired by Mattel’s beloved cheeky penguin who lives in the South Pole and has stayed on our screens for decades, famous for his mischief and catchphrase, “Noot Noot!” Designed by Otmar Gutmann in the 1980s, the show first aired on the U.K.’s BBC One in 1990.

Josh Silverman, chief franchise officer of Mattel, told The Hollywood Reporter at MIPCOM Cannes on Monday: “You couldn’t ask for a more perfect marriage [than between Mattel and Aardman]. I was just with their their team. We are overjoyed about the project. It’s going to be really, really special. Pingu just continues to, organically, have a tremendous amount of affection and attention. And a tremendous amount of relevance.”

The Pingu series will be co-developed by Sarah Cox and Alan Thorpe for Aardman, and Sidney Clifton, Rob David and Melanie Shannon for Mattel Television Studios. The toy company acquired Pingu through its purchase of HIT Entertainment in 2011.

Silverman spoke about Mattel’s mission to capitalize on what can be best described as “new-stalgia” — shows, effectively, that resonate with both adults and children because of Mattel’s long-lasting legacy. For example, the familiar purple dinosaur Barney who got a new premiere with the rebooted Barney’s World on Oct. 14. “It’s an IP that is nostalgic for adults, but new for preschoolers.”

He continued: “And so Barney really fits very quite well there. It’s really entertaining and fun for kids, but allows adults to hearken back to their childhood, their emotional connection to a piece of IP, to this story, this narrative. Instead of watching with children, you are watching with your children and enjoying it together. And I think that it’s something really unique, and something we’re going to continue to so lean into as we mine our portfolio.”

Are Mattel trying to replicate the magic in television that they were able to achieve with Greta Gerwig’s billion-dollar hit Barbie? “What we’re really trying not to do is compare or contrast,” Silverman said. “Each project really stands on its own. Barbie was an incredible partnership, obviously, with Greta who is one of the most incredible creatives on the planet, and it was such a special collaboration.”

“I think, on the content side, we work with the best creatives who have a real connection to the [project], we collaborate and we trust, and that’s the ingredients, in many ways, of what you saw come through with Barbie.” Aardman, it seems, represents the kinds of creatives that Mattel want to place their bets on.