28th April 2011
Upstart writer Lindsay Sedgwick writes about her innovative new animation project for RTE children’s programming:
On the 28th of April, courtesy of the Dublin Lord Mayor, Down Syndrome Ireland and RTE will launch the series I created, PUNKY, in the Mansion House. Produced by Monster Animation, PUNKY will be aired on RTEJr from May 3rd, twice daily on weekdays for four weeks. After four years of hard graft, the idea I conceived is finally ready to be gorgeously birthed!
This has happened thanks to the determination of the producer Gerard O’Rourke who believed as firmly as me that it had to be made.
Why? ‘Cos it’s different. It is the first mainstream cartoon ever – as far as we can ascertain – to be centred around a main character with special needs. Punky is feisty, fun, frustrating and loveable. She lives in the moment and she also happens to have Down syndrome. She is voiced by Aimee Richardson who has brought the character to life. Aimee also has the Down syndrome and is an ambassador for Down Syndrome Ireland, who have been behind the project and excited about it since I first contacted them in early 2008 after getting development funding from the Irish Film Board.
But it all began in early 2007 with a ten minute animated script called Bookcraft where a dog got changed into a rooster and Punky’s brother got changed into a girl…
(Yup, it had a lot going on. Chaos seems to follow me into scripts whether I want it to or not but we’re in serious discussions. Chaos has now promised to stay for inspiration processes only but then slip into a separate file on the desktop and try not to sulk. I’m sure it will sulk though and we’ll probably suffer separation anxiety for a draft or two of each project. We’ll come out stronger!)
But here’s the thing: That short script has since proven to be the germ for an animated feature, a live action feature, this series PUNKY, another short that will go into competition soon and another series idea that will, hopefully, follow Punky’s esteemed footsteps in due course. So the chaos works, it just has to be channelled right!
So, if Bookcraft still hasn’t been made, I can’t complain. Maybe its role was a bit like those magic beans Jack brought home? Meanwhile, I have the bottle of Jameson primed to celebrate Punky’s arrival on the small screen. Though seems a little odd to be celebrating the arrival of a pre-school series with hard liquor, I think I can handle it!
http://upstart.ie/blog/?p=1013
And here she is...
Launched April 28 2011
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Punky creator interviewed on Upstart Blog (http://upstart.ie/blog/?p=1170)
11 May 2011
Update on Upstart writers: Anne Parsons interviews Lindsay Sedgwick
‘Punky’ is a really good name for a kids’ cartoon show. All the junior infants my sister teaches were raving about ‘Punky’ this week when she showed them the beautifully animated first episode from the website. They all loved it.
Punky follows the adventures of a little girl who has Down Syndrome, and is the first show of its kind. “As far as I could find out, a child with special needs had never been the star of a mainstream children’s show and certainly not of a cartoon,” Lindsay J Sedgwick, the creator of the recently launched RTEjr cartoon show, told me when I caught up with her last week. “I had to give it a go.”
Sedgwick, a writer with an MA in Screenwriting for TV and Film developed the idea into a television series having been inspired by the relationship her partner’s son, who is severely autistic, has with his sister. This fascination was the germ for what became Punky, she says.
Sedgwick’s decision to write about a character with Down Syndrome largely came about through having good friends with relations who have Down Syndrome. “The stories they told me were very funny,” she says. “Very tender and, to a writer, so stimulating and rich that I knew I wanted to find a way to tell stories like these.”
Sedgwick wanted to explore the impact a child with special needs has on the whole family and convey how that child affects the people and the world around her for the better. Sedgwick was determined that her central character would have special needs and adamant that the stories were to be about the world experienced through this child’s eyes.
Punky is a great example of using the arts as a platform to explore and challenge ideas and broaden horizons. It is a show about accepting differences. By reaching children at a young age (3-6 years), through the medium of “entertaining stories, loveable characters and fun”, Sedgwick hopes they will be taught that difference is a good thing. A show like Punky hopes to encourage children to be more thoughtful and inclusive of people who are different.
The show has created a buzz in the last few weeks in the national papers and on television, with interviews of Aimee Richardson, the voice of Punky and Lindsay Sedgwick herself. Punky even has her own Facebook page and Twitter.
Yet this is only the beginning for Punky, whose 7 minute episodes have been aired on RTEJr from May 3rd, twice daily on weekdays for four weeks. Sedgwick hopes that her eponymous character will grow up with the generation that start watching it now, on through their formative years, or might return in a few years when Punky is a bit older. “As originally envisaged, she was eight or nine, so the stories and the material are there, waiting.”
As regards any advice for hopeful writers out there, Sedgwick concedes that times are tough and attributes much of her success at getting Punky off the ground to the encouragement of Andrew Meehan of the Irish Film Board and the determination of Gerard O’Rourke of Monster Animation, of whom Sedgwick says, “He loved the idea and wanted it to be made as much as I did.” Yet she says “about ten projects I worked on last year, with producers attached, failed to get funded. The money isn’t out there. I don’t know anyone who survives by public funding.”
She urges writers to stay engaged however. “Keep writing whenever ten minutes becomes free, be a little more selfish with your free time so you can carve space to create and don’t expect to write wonderful material every time you sit down to write. Try not to give up.”
Interview by Anne Parsons. (http://upstart.ie/blog/?p=1170)
Update on Upstart writers: Anne Parsons interviews Lindsay Sedgwick
‘Punky’ is a really good name for a kids’ cartoon show. All the junior infants my sister teaches were raving about ‘Punky’ this week when she showed them the beautifully animated first episode from the website. They all loved it.
Punky follows the adventures of a little girl who has Down Syndrome, and is the first show of its kind. “As far as I could find out, a child with special needs had never been the star of a mainstream children’s show and certainly not of a cartoon,” Lindsay J Sedgwick, the creator of the recently launched RTEjr cartoon show, told me when I caught up with her last week. “I had to give it a go.”
Sedgwick, a writer with an MA in Screenwriting for TV and Film developed the idea into a television series having been inspired by the relationship her partner’s son, who is severely autistic, has with his sister. This fascination was the germ for what became Punky, she says.
Sedgwick’s decision to write about a character with Down Syndrome largely came about through having good friends with relations who have Down Syndrome. “The stories they told me were very funny,” she says. “Very tender and, to a writer, so stimulating and rich that I knew I wanted to find a way to tell stories like these.”
Sedgwick wanted to explore the impact a child with special needs has on the whole family and convey how that child affects the people and the world around her for the better. Sedgwick was determined that her central character would have special needs and adamant that the stories were to be about the world experienced through this child’s eyes.
Punky is a great example of using the arts as a platform to explore and challenge ideas and broaden horizons. It is a show about accepting differences. By reaching children at a young age (3-6 years), through the medium of “entertaining stories, loveable characters and fun”, Sedgwick hopes they will be taught that difference is a good thing. A show like Punky hopes to encourage children to be more thoughtful and inclusive of people who are different.
The show has created a buzz in the last few weeks in the national papers and on television, with interviews of Aimee Richardson, the voice of Punky and Lindsay Sedgwick herself. Punky even has her own Facebook page and Twitter.
Yet this is only the beginning for Punky, whose 7 minute episodes have been aired on RTEJr from May 3rd, twice daily on weekdays for four weeks. Sedgwick hopes that her eponymous character will grow up with the generation that start watching it now, on through their formative years, or might return in a few years when Punky is a bit older. “As originally envisaged, she was eight or nine, so the stories and the material are there, waiting.”
As regards any advice for hopeful writers out there, Sedgwick concedes that times are tough and attributes much of her success at getting Punky off the ground to the encouragement of Andrew Meehan of the Irish Film Board and the determination of Gerard O’Rourke of Monster Animation, of whom Sedgwick says, “He loved the idea and wanted it to be made as much as I did.” Yet she says “about ten projects I worked on last year, with producers attached, failed to get funded. The money isn’t out there. I don’t know anyone who survives by public funding.”
She urges writers to stay engaged however. “Keep writing whenever ten minutes becomes free, be a little more selfish with your free time so you can carve space to create and don’t expect to write wonderful material every time you sit down to write. Try not to give up.”
Interview by Anne Parsons. (http://upstart.ie/blog/?p=1170)
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