British children's TV series
Pipkins
(originally
Inigo Pipkin
) is a British children's TV programme. Hartley Hare, Pig, Topov, Octavia and the gang were the stars of
ATV
's pre-school series which ran from January 1973 to 29 December 1981.
[1]
Pipkins
was one of the first children's programmes on British TV where the characters had regional accents: Pig had a
Birmingham accent
; Topov the monkey was a
Cockney
; Octavia the ostrich had a
French
accent; Pigeon had an
Upper class
English
accent; Mrs Penguin had a
Geordie
accent; Uncle Hare had a
West Country English
accent; Sophie the cat had a non-regional English accent; and Moony the Badger had a
Northern Ireland
accent.
Origins
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In 1972, the
ITV
network expanded its daytime broadcasting hours and the
Independent Broadcasting Authority
commissioned four of the main ITV companies to each provide a series of interest to pre-schoolers, as an alternative to the successful US import
Sesame Street
. From this commission
Thames Television
came up with
Rainbow
,
Yorkshire
with
Mister Trimble
,
Granada
with
Hickory House
, while
ATV
's contribution would be
Inigo Pipkin
.
Inigo Pipkin
was first shown on
New Year's Day
1973. When the show started, the main character was an elderly puppet maker called Inigo Pipkin (hence the original title), played by
George Woodbridge
. The puppets were his creations, and over the course of the first series, viewers saw Inigo bring to life Hartley Hare and the Tortoise (a.k.a. George) played by
Nigel Plaskitt
; and Topov the
monkey
, Pig and Octavia the
ostrich
, all played by
Heather Tobias
.
However, Woodbridge died suddenly from a heart attack in March 1973, while recording of the second series was still taking place.
Inigo Pipkin
was not recorded in the order it was transmitted, and Woodbridge had only completed taping of the latter episodes. The scripts for the episodes that would be broadcast first in the transmission run, i.e. those that Woodbridge had not managed to record, were thus hastily rewritten, with Inigo's absence explained by his being away on a fishing holiday.
In 1974, in a first for children's television, the death of Inigo was worked into the programme, predating the
Mr Hooper
episode on
Sesame Street
by nine years. From this episode onwards, the show was renamed
Pipkins
and Inigo's assistant, Johnny (
Wayne Laryea
), took over. The direction of the programme had to change; from here on, the show ceased to centre around a puppet workshop and the characters became the 'Help People', helping anyone in need of a hand. Similarly, another episode "Death of a Goldfish" dealt with the topic of death, in regards to losing a pet. Topov the monkey and Johnny discussed why the goldfish died and why people die.
Johnny left
Pipkins
around 1978, to be replaced by Tom (
Jonathan Kydd
), who moved on in 1980, his place taken by Peter Potter (
Paddy O'Hagan
). In later years
Sue Nicholls
made regular appearances as the Pipkins' neighbour, Mrs Muddle. The name was somewhat ironic as she was always a calming, self-assured presence around the puppets.
The familiar workshop set was replaced in 1979 (in the story "Moving Out"), with new interiors based around a kitchen and backyard. The new set was built up from ground level to enable puppeteers to work standing up and to move around more freely, modelled on the methods used by
The Muppet Show
which was also filmed at
ATV Elstree Studios
.
Cancellation
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Pipkins
ended when ATV lost its franchise for the Midlands ITV region, was restructured and became
Central Independent Television
. The programme was replaced by
Let's Pretend
.
The series was made at ATV Elstree Studios, with occasional filming on location. For the
Inigo Pipkin
episodes, the opening and closing titles were sung by
Jackie Lee
, who had earlier sung the themes to children's programmes
The Adventures of Rupert Bear
and
White Horses
.
Unusually for a children's programme, there was no spin-off
Pipkins
merchandise (toys, games, books etc.) produced during the programme's run.
Archive status
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In common with other 1970s shows, several
Pipkins
episodes recorded on 625 line PAL colour videotape ? including the very first
Inigo Pipkin
? are missing from the archives (poor storage of former ATV master colour videotapes has led to the loss of many shows), and not even any 16mm black-and-white film copies of the lost episodes exist.
Out of a total of 333 episodes, only 135 have survived. The other 197 episodes no longer exist in any format, while two others exist on 625 line PAL colour videotape only as incomplete copies (possibly due to videotape damage caused by poor storage).
Nigel Plaskitt
? who provided the show's narration, as well as voicing and operating Hartley and Tortoise ? made off-air domestic videocassette recordings of around 56 episodes, now the only format in which these are known to exist, and some have been used for the DVD release in the UK.
[2]
Cast
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References
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External links
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