Lloyd Evans
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‘Shaun was the star of A Close Shave,’ Bullough tells me, ‘which was Nick Park’s third film. [It was also the third film to feature perhaps Aardman’s most famous characters, Wallace and Gromit.] That was a breakthrough moment for Aardman as a studio. It was the beginning of our huge merchandising and licensing business.’ He and his company are rightly proud of the woolly hero, whose image is on display throughout their vast, swish, open-plan headquarters in Bristol. The spin-off TV series is seen in 180 countries around the world. So who’s missing out? ‘Some islands somewhere, I guess,’ says Bullough. ‘San Marino maybe. For a while we weren’t on air in New Zealand. I couldn’t understand that unless they thought sheep were vermin.’ Don’t some New Zealanders regard sheep as sacred? ‘That’s the good thing about sheep. They’re not sacred, or offensive, to any culture. They’re just sheep.’ Bullough is a curious mixture of chucklesome whimsy and corporate steel. He has a soft crinkly face, a strange blond moustache, and a pair of thick black spectacles. He could easily pass as a children’s party entertainer. But he’s able to switch instantly from chortling wisecrackery to lists of percentages, ratios and margins. And right now he’s concerned about Aardman — which employs 600 staff and turns over £50 million a year — whose profitability is threatened by the more favourable tax regimes on offer abroad.
‘If you produce children’s animation in Ireland, Canada, France, Germany, the Benelux countries or Australia, your industry enjoys a huge amount of support from government. There are quotas, subsidies and tax credits. Clearly our politicians can’t wave a magic wand and make everyone else’s tax credits go away. But we’ve asked for a credit of 15 to 20 per cent on corporation tax to be introduced, along similar lines to the film tax credit. Then we can catch up with the competition in one leap.’ The matter is urgent. Next spring he hopes to begin production on a new pre-school show, Ploo, which will generate £3 million of business for Aardman and create up to 40 jobs. ‘A dozen top-notch broadcasters are ready to buy it,’ he says, ‘and our first choice would be to do all the work in Bristol.’ But the attractions of a German co-production may prove irresistible. ‘To unlock the maximum German subsidy, all the labour-intensive work would go over there. And we’d end up with five or six jobs in UK.’
He should phone the Treasury, I suggest. Or buttonhole someone in the Cabinet. ‘I have. David Cameron came here three months ago. Ed Vaizey (the Culture minister) has been down. We’re one of the places people like to visit in the West Country.’ Both, he tells me tactfully, were ‘sympathetic and well-briefed’. ‘But even if the Treasury announced the tax credit it would probably take a year to come in. So people who specialise in children’s television are going to start diversifying into games or interactive apps. The industry will shrink.’ But it’s not just about the money, I suggest to him, and he slips instantly into his chortling wisecracking mode. ‘No, it’s about our cultural heritage. What’s going to happen to Bob the Builder now that the show’s produced in Canada? Will he end up driving on the wrong side of the road? A great British icon might start speaking with a North American accent!’
I ask about recent reports that he had threatened to move Aardman overseas. ‘Slightly taken out of context,’ he says, smoothly. ‘We’re a British company and proud of it. We’re a Bristol company and proud of it. We’re not leaving here in a hurry.’ And he’ll continue offering jobs to all our home-grown animators? Here he demurs. ‘Each year in the UK we graduate two to three thousand animation students. The total workforce is six or seven thousand. So we’re graduating a third of the workforce annually. There’s going to be a lot of unemployment.’
Bullough got his start working as a runner at a film-production company. Is that still the best way in? ‘Yes, although when I began it was beyond my means to make a film. These days, with your Apple Mac, a few mates and some free software, you can do it. So if you want to get into films, make a film.’
His mission now is to ‘scour the planet’ looking for new products with the ‘magical combination’. Which is what? ‘A really endearing, lovable character that makes you smile just to look at it, and which you can see in an ensemble situation, generating story after story after story.’ External producers constantly bombard him with ideas, ‘of which we pick up almost none. We find the best ones come from people close to home. So it’s me walking round the building, saying, “What are you doing there?” And “That’s funny, we can have a look at that and spend a bit of money on it.” We might encourage someone to develop a character they’ve been doodling… or whatever. So we develop a lot of ideas in house.’
That Aardman can use this haphazard and leisurely method to convert ‘doodling… or whatever’ into box-office gold is a tribute to the extraordinary position the firm has built for itself within the business. Clearly it works. Their most recent release, Arthur Christmas, was a CGI blockbuster co-produced by Sony. Next spring they launch Pirates, an animated feature to be voiced by Hugh Grant. ‘One doesn’t want to overstate it,’ says Bullough, ‘but Aardman reinvented animation in the UK. There’d still be a great animation industry here without us. But we have four Oscars, and hundreds of other awards, so we’re a big British success story.’ He leans close over the tape recorder. ‘We’re very proud of that, Mr Cameron. But we need all the help we can get!’
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