Bob the Builder is a British animated children's television series created by Keith Chapman for HIT Entertainment and Hot Animation. The series follows the adventures of Bob, a general contractor, specialising in masonry, along with his colleague Wendy, various neighbours, and friends, and equipment, and their gang of anthropomorphised work-vehicles, Scoop, Muck, Dizzy, Roley, Lofty and many others. The series ran from 12 April 1999 to 31 December 2011 in the United Kingdom through the CBBC strand and later CBeebies. The series originally used stop-motion from 1999 to 2009, but later used CGI animation starting with the spin-off series Ready, Steady, Build! (2010-2011). The British proprietors of Bob the Builder and Thomas & Friends sold the enterprise in 2011 to US toy-maker Mattel for $680 million.
Cosgrove Hall Films was a British animation studio founded by Brian Cosgrove and Mark Hall, headquartered in Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Manchester. Cosgrove Hall was a major producer of children's television and animated programmes/films, which are still seen in over eighty countries. The company was wound down by its then owner, ITV plc, on 26 October 2009. It was mainly known for its series Danger Mouse, The Wind in the Willows and Count Duckula.
HIT Entertainment Limited was a British-American entertainment company founded in 1982 as Henson International Television, the international distribution arm of The Jim Henson Company, by Jim Henson, Peter Orton, and Sophie Turner Laing. Orton alone took over the company in 1989 after learning Henson intended to sell the company to The Walt Disney Company. HIT owned and distributed children's television series such as Thomas & Friends, Fireman Sam, Bob the Builder, Pingu, Barney & Friends, and Angelina Ballerina.
DreamWorks Classics is an American entertainment company owned by DreamWorks Animation, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is a subsidiary of Comcast. Founded as Classic Media in 2000 by Eric Ellenbogen and John Engelman, The studio's library consists of acquired intellectual property catalogs and character brands, as well as the licensing rights for various third-party properties. In 2012, Boomerang Media sold Classic Media to DreamWorks Animation, who rebranded the company as DreamWorks Classics. DreamWorks Animation became a subsidiary of NBCUniversal in 2016.
DreamWorks Animation LLC (DWA) (also known as DreamWorks Animation Studios or simply DreamWorks) is an American animation studio owned by Universal Pictures, a division of NBCUniversal, which is itself a subsidiary of Comcast. The studio has released a total of 48 feature films, including several of the highest-grossing animated films of all time, with Shrek 2 (2004) having been the highest at the time of its release. Its first film, Antz, was released on October 2, 1998, and its latest film was Kung Fu Panda 4 on March 8, 2024; their upcoming theatrical slate of films includes The Wild Robot on September 20, 2024, Dog Man on January 31, 2025, and The Bad Guys 2 on August 1, 2025. Additionally, DreamWorks has reserved a release date for an untitled animated film on September 26, 2025.
Chorion Limited was a multinational media production company with offices in London, New York, and Sydney. The company produced TV shows and feature films, and was best known for its portfolio of entertainment brands. These included children's characters such as Paddington Bear, Peter Rabbit, The Mr. Men, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Olivia, Gaspard and Lisa and Noddy. The company also owned the rights to the Agatha Christie Estate, Raymond Chandler, and Georges Simenon.
Room 785 is a children's television programme broadcast on the BFBS 1 channel, part of the British Forces Broadcasting Service. It had a similar format to CBBC in that the presenters were situated in a small studio and introduced the programmes from there. There was more emphasis on emailing and texting in to the show, as it was broadcast wherever BFBS was received and allowed children to send messages to their parents who may have been on operations.
Milkshake! is a British children's television programming block on Channel 5 and is currently aimed at children aged 2 to 7.
Fifi and the Flowertots is a British animated television series created by Keith Chapman for Five and Nick Jr. It aired from 2 May 2005 to 5 July 2010. Chapman Entertainment produced the show, which was animated by Cosgrove Hall Films.
Timothy Charles Whitnall is an English actor, playwright and screenwriter. He is known for playing Angelo in the long-running CITV series Mike and Angelo and narrating the BBC children's TV programme Teletubbies from 1997 to 2001. As a writer, he has won a BAFTA and an Olivier Award for his work on TV movie Best Possible Taste: The Kenny Everett Story and play Morecambe. He is also a voice actor, providing voices on characters from television shows such as Fifi and the Flowertots, Roary the Racing Car, and Thomas & Friends.
Keith Vincent Chapman is a British television writer and producer, best known as the creator of children's television programmes Bob the Builder, Mighty Express, Fifi and the Flowertots and PAW Patrol.
Maria Darling is a British voice actress who has provided many character voices for children's television programmes in the United Kingdom and the United States. She is known for voicing Dizzy and Roley in the US version of Bob the Builder.
Roary the Racing Car is a British animated television series created by David Jenkins and produced by Chapman Entertainment and Cosgrove Hall Films for Five and Nick Jr. It follows the adventures of Roary and his racing car friends at Silver Hatch race track.
Sunny Side Up is a defunct television programming block which premiered on Sprout on September 26, 2007 and ended on August 11, 2017. Each week, a new theme was introduced, including food, Halloween, animals, construction, fall, opposites, and birthdays. Sunny Side Up aired at 9:00 AM Eastern/8:00 AM Central until 12:00 PM Eastern/11:00 AM Central each weekday morning. The hosts of Sunny Side Up played games, sang songs, told stories, and showed birthday cards or artwork.
Marc Silk is a British voice actor. His character vocal work includes Aks Moe in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, the 2015 reboot of Danger Mouse, The Pingu Show, The Lingo Show, Go Jetters, Strange Hill High, Chicken Run and US voice of Bob and several other characters in Bob the Builder.
Big Idea Productions, LLC is an American animation production company, best known for its animated VeggieTales series of Christian-themed home videos.
CHF Entertainment was an animation studio formed in 2011. It was the reincarnation of the animation company Cosgrove Hall Films which closed in 2009 after 33 years. Brian Cosgrove and Mark Hall formed and ran the original Cosgrove Hall creating over 1000 episodes of animated programs such as Danger Mouse, Cockleshell Bay, Count Duckula, Lavender Castle and The Wind in the Willows, and produced Fifi and the Flowertots, Postman Pat, and Roary the Racing Car. They won a number of awards, including six BAFTAs and two international Emmys.
Studio Liddell Ltd. is a British computer animation and imagery production studio based in Manchester, UK. It was founded in 1996 by Ian Liddell, Jon Liddell, and Andrew Jones. The company began by producing imagery for advertising and technical purposes and later successfully expanded into children's television creating shows such as Cloudbabies, Ranger Rob, and working on Roary The Racing Car, Let's Play, Raa Raa The Noisy Lion, and Fifi & The Flowertots. In recent years the company has also expanded into Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality technologies.
Universal Kids is an American children's television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division of NBCUniversal, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Comcast.
DreamWorks Animation Television is an American animation studio that serves as the television production arm of DreamWorks Animation, itself a subsidiary of Universal Pictures and a division of Comcast's NBCUniversal. Founded in 1996, the entity was formerly named DreamWorks Television Animation. Its first programs from the 1990s and early 2000s used the live-action television logo, and were produced by DreamWorks Television, before DWATV and its parent company were spun off into an independent company in 2004 and later purchased by NBCUniversal in 2016. In total, the division has released 57 programs, with 8 in development.
