Man in a Cat screening at Light House

We've had two screenings of our animated short All Consuming love (Man in a Cat) so far, and now there's a screening at Wolverhampton's Light House cinema on Tuesday, 5 April. In even better news, it's free to the public, so you can come along, see the film and watch the five other Digishorts filmed commissioned along with ours.

Here's what's going on:

On Tuesday 5 April from 7pm the Light House in Wolverhampton will be screening six short films made by the most exciting filmmaking talent emerging from the West Midlands region. In partnership with the UK Film Council, Digishorts was a yearly scheme run by Screen WM offering West Midlands based filmmakers and animators the opportunity to produce innovative and striking short digital films. In its eighth and final year, the slate of films produced demonstrate regional filmmaking at its strongest.

I think we'll be doing another panel discussion after the screening and we'll be hanging around for a little afterwards to have a chat, so do come and say hi.

To book a free place at the screening, email ayesha@light-house.co.uk.

See you there!

Viva Los Birmingham

Man In A Cat's set in Birmingham dontcha know? More specifically New Oscott - it's got a big Tesco.

Hmm... If you count all of those trees I'd say there were more trees per capita then any other city in the UK (Sutton Park skews the figures).

One of Dulux's More Unusual Colour Charts

A Little Peek

You've all been incredibly patient waiting for Man In A Cat to raise it's misunderstood head. So, here's a little pic to tide you over while we do the final push.

Yorkie Online!

Our favourite cat dwelling hermit has got hold of a phone and is now preoccupying himself online and making a few friends on Facebook.

Go and say hello by clicking the phrase moist innards.

Man In A Cat Dialogue Recording

Ah, the days when people wore just one layer... Here's us recording with Kevin Eldon, Josie Long and Isabel Fay for Man In A Cat:

What we've been up to this week

It's been a busy week for us. On Tuesday night we met up for a drink in Soho with Dave and Louis from Rocket Sausage, who are going great guns with their sketches featuring on Big Brother. Lots of silliness and a homeless scouser with three terrible jokes punctuated the evening, but somehow we got round to more serious matters, so hopefully we'll be doing some collaborational doo-hickeys with them in the not-so-distant future.

On Wednesday we recorded the audio for Man in a Cat with Kevin Eldon, Josie Long and Isabel Fay. We'll do a proper round-up of how that went soon with some pics and maybe even a video.

Then on Sunday we went to Fazeley Studios to film the second segment of our new sketch with filmmaker and photographer Chris Stokes. Well, I say new, but it was written aaaaaaages ago.

Anyway, much fun was had and we had the added bonus of being given a load of very tasty equipment from the legend that is Lee from Fullrange. We got upgraded to a beast of a camera with a dedo light and a field monitor. Woop!

We got some really funny stuff so I'm quite hopeful for how this one will turn out when it's cut together.

That's all for the mo, but check out Rocket Sausage's films, have a look at Chris Stokes' website, and give praise to Fullrange for their generosity.

Say hello to Kevin, Josie and Isabel

Well flip me sideways we confirmed a very special cast to fill the roles of Yorkie, Susan and Michelle!

First up is the genius Kevin Eldon, who has appeared in almost every sitcom and sketch show worth it's weight in gold for the past 20 years.

Kevin came to fame on Lee & Herring's TV shows with the characters Simon Quinlack and False Rod Hull, you probably best know him from Big Train, Blue Jam, or one of the seemingly infinite guest appearances which captured your imagination for the 5 minutes he was on screen.

This man is ingrained in my comedy DNA.


Josie Long is possibly the best female stand-up comedian in the UK right now, she's certainly the most heart-warming. As well as the slew of panel shows she was also a regular co-writer for Skins.

The first time I saw Josie Long live was in 2007 at a corporate party at the Edinburgh Fringe, she got us all to sit cross legged around the small stage. It was lovely.




Isabel Fay is a fantastic comic actor who is part of internet comedy production outfit, Clever Pie. She's been in E4 sketch show, Dog Face, BBC's How Not To Live Your Life, and has already acted with Kevin Eldon before.



For those who still don't know their cheese from their beans, here's just some of the many faces of Kevin Eldon.

Dice Interview In The Birmingham Mail

In their infinite wisdom, the Birmingham Mail decided to have a good old chat with us about all things Dice Productions, Popcorn Comedy and Man in a Cat. Hooray!

You can read it in full by clicking here.

In summary, Ian said that we're planning to move to Belgium to become industrial cleaners, specialising in discontinued abattoir equipment. He said: "Frankly, running a comedy night like Popcorn, writing comedy, and making an animated short film about a man inside a cat has taken its toll." Biting his nails profusely, Ian added: "Just leave me alone. I need to cry and pack my industrial scouring pads and medicinal vodka."

It's a compelling read.

To see us, Adil Ray and Fergus Craig at Popcorn Comedy at The Victoria on Thursday 24th June, go to: http://popcornbrum.eventbrite.com/


Here's a photo of the beast itself.

Man In A Cat Updates On Their Way

We've been realising how many firsts and blummin' cool things are going to be in Man In A Cat that you don't even know about yet! More videos and updates to come later this month. Meanwhile here's three, count 'em, three explosions!

Man In A Cat Diaries YouTube Channel

For fear of this becoming the Man In A Cat /Popcorn /Man In A Cat blog, we've set up a new YouTube channel dedicated to any behind the scenes interviews, 'making of's and in-progress linetests. Subscribe to it at: http://www.youtube.com/AllConsumingLove.

In other news, I got me a big lightbox! A lot of scenes could do with being cleaned up in A3 and I want something proper to draw on. Here's the evolution of my (until now) homemade lightboxes. That little one is still my trusty companion. His name is Arthur. The red one is Gordon, named after the then Chancellor of the Exchequer. This new one is secondhand but I didn't catch it's name. I'll have to take it to the vet to find out what sex it is. What do you think?

In unconfirmed news we have a very lovely producer attached, plus I'll be sharing some new offices to get me out of the house and stop me becoming the summery equivalent of Jack Nicholson in the Shining. More on that later.

Here's a little making of to show us out:

Man In A Cat is Commissioned!

Start the fanfare please Freddo!

We're amazingly chuffed to say that out of over 130 proposals All Consuming Love (Man In A Cat) has impressed Screen WM and the UK Film Council enough to become one of the final 6 commissioned films! It's not all that often you get to be completely self-indulgent on a project for 6 months, especially with the support and backing of some the most experienced people in the country.

So far we've had to be fairly hush hush about the development process, if only because we'd look like wankers if the film never actually took off, but now would be a nice time to say thanks to the people we've met and who have helped us get here.

The process up to getting commissioned has been fantastic. Before that development process it was getting hard to know what to do with the story. On the first day of development we met Kate Leys, who just with a few anecdotes and case examples, completely opened our eyes to the art of story telling. That was really empowering.

I also had the priveledge of bashing out ideas with Camilla Deacon of Lupus Films and about 15 other talented animators in London. That was really invigorating and affirmed a lot of what we've been learning over the last 3 months. Big thanks to The Square for seemingly unlimited chocolate, fruit, coffee and some quite spiffing toilets! Not unlimited toilets. That would be incredible... ANYWAY.

Simon Flynn and Dan Lawson from Screen WM, and June Goldrei on behalf of UK Film Council were in charge of commissioning the final films. They had the balls to see that this could work, and their notes and questions have made sure the story has developed in a very nurturing and understanding way.

Overall, we're really thankful that we've been given the chance to make this unsual and edgy film, and that everyone involved were nuts enough to with the idea in the first place. Now we've got to hammer out the last few kinks in the script without desmantling the whole thing, get the look of it all completely pinned down, get some communal office space/therapy for me, and round up some amazing talent to help out with the project. All within the next couple of weeks if we're to have a good chance of finishing this by the end of August! Ha ha ha!... Oh my God.

Recommence the fanfare please!

Wait! Is that...? Nah. Couldn't be. Doesn't matter.

Man In A Cat's Shortlisted for Funding

All Consuming Love (Man In A Cat) has been shortlisted for Digishorts funding! Nice Stuff!

X-Factor styley, over 100 entries have been whittled down to 12. After the development process 6 of those will be commissioned. Next week we'll be starting off with a day of discussion and workshops with the other shortlisters and Kate Leys. The development process will go on through till March when we'll see... If all goes well and we get the green light, we'll be chucking up regular updates here for you to track the progression of the film.

While 'Man In A Cat has been talked about for a while, and the tester trailer alone has got over 850,000 views, it had to stand on ice for a while as our other projects and work relationships developed. But after having the storyboards on my wall for over a year it'll be great to get some outside input. I'm particularly excited to see how the original story changes. While I love the idea of a Man, Woman, Cat love triangle (not like that), there's still plenty that could be done on the script.

So let's start from the beginning shall we? Here's where the original idea taken from my sketchbook when I was 16, which was taken from Tony Lopes' Odd Streak strip.

Huh, will yer look at that. Message in a Bottle was on the same page. Page 32 was obviously drinking well that year.

ANOTHER YouTube Feature + Cue for Music Composer

WTFs, LOLs and ROFLs are being banded around like nobody's business as the trailer for All Consuming Love (Man In A Cat) gets featured on YouTube. That makes two features in two weeks! If you can't see it being featured, that because it's featured 'Globally' and not in Britain... You'll have to ask YouTube how that one works.

The trailer does feature the opening score to Forest Gump. That was done as a last minute choice as things had got stuck with my sound designer at the time and the music does actually suit quite nicely. So, he next thing will be to get a lovely sound designer onboard and get all that sorted out.

All Consuming Love (Man in a Cat) Trailer

Here's the lastest glimpse of the upcoming film, All Consuming Love (Man in a Cat). Should be a good'un when it's done.

'All Consuming Love' poster

Here's the flyer of what Louis' been working on for the last 9 months. Tagline - 'Coming out of a cat's ass near you...' It also doubles as a lovely postcard, so now you can inform both distant friends and estranged relatives about the pros and cons of potential beastiality attacks. Useful AND entertaining!