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Home > Screenings > UK Animation Digital Pitch 2022 > Rathbone's Antiques



Pitchees:

Billy Mpetha and Billie Collins

Rathbone's Antiques

This summer, 11-year-old LIAM’s family are taking his brother REX to an elite football camp in Spain. Allergic to heat (and sport), Liam is sent to stay at his mysterious UNCLE RATHBONE’S antiques shop – a place where everything is cursed, possessed or hungry. Liverpool’s happiest goth PRINNY soon stumbles onto the scene, and together the young misfits must take on whatever absurd or downright dangerous tasks Rathbone throws their way.

Occasionally hindered by RODERICK (an impossibly cynical talking magpie) and helped by Mei (the eco-queen next door), Liam and Prinny must face their fears, expose whatever nefarious business Rathbone is conducting in his office and learn that – just like the antiques – they’re too precious to be written off.

Tell me more…
Each episode has its own adventure – either Rathbone gives Liam and Prinny a perilous task, a customer wreaks havoc, or a bewitched antique lands them in hot water. The show is also lightly serialised, with a few ongoing plots simmering away: Prinny’s crush on Mei, Liam and Rex’s reconciliation and the suspicion that Rathbone is up to no good. Tonally, the show isn’t afraid of a little darkness and for every tender moment there’s a man-eating triffid. It’s like The Addams Family meets The Antiques Roadshow, full of heart and set in Merseyside.

Project Information:
Director: TBA (Talked with a few directors but nothing set in stone)
Producer: Billy Mpetha
Partners: BFI funded original development as part of the YACF
Development stage: Pitch Bible and Pilot Script created
Planned shooting start:N/A
Shooting location: Liverpool/Manchester/Ireland
Languages: English (currently)
Total budget: £4,720,743.48
Budget per episode: £363,134.11
Financing already in place: 0

Looking for from the International Business: Commissioning Broadcasters / Pre-Sales / Co-production studios

Company profile: Rathbone's Antiques has been co-developed by Toastie Animation LTD and writer Billie Collins – both raised in Merseyside and based in Manchester. Toastie Animation is a young studio started by Billy Mpetha with the aim of creating great character led animation. Billy (with a ‘y’) has 7 years’ industry experience on 2D animated projects for Disney, Nickelodeon, and the BBC. Billie (with an ‘ie’) writes for stage, screen and audio, with a particular focus on coming of age, queer and magical realist stories.

Contact: Billy Mpetha
Email: [email protected]