![]() |
Mark Burton | |
---|---|
![]() Burton in 2015 | |
Born | |
Nationality | British |
Occupations |
|
Years active | 1986–present |
Notable work | Madagascar Wallace and Gromit: the Curse of the Were-Rabbit Shaun the Sheep Movie Early Man A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon |
Mark Burton (born 23 September 1960) is a British television writer, screenwriter, television producer, film producer, and film director.
After turning up at BBC Radio's Light Entertainment Department, Burton teamed up with John O'Farrell and the two were commissioned for Week Ending by Harry Thompson (who later named his two pet rats Burton and O'Farrell). The pair won the BBC Light Entertainment Contract Award, and went on to write or contribute to a number of radio series, including Little Blighty on the Down, McKay the New and with Pete Sinclair, the multi-award-winning A Look Back at the Nineties and Look Back at the Future in which Burton also performed. [1] Burton also created the BBC Radio 4 panel game We've Been Here Before presented by Clive Anderson.
Burton and O’Farrell were commissioned for Spitting Image in 1988 and the following year became two of the lead writers on the show. They also wrote for Clive Anderson Talks Back, Nick Hancock on Room 101, Murder Most Horrid , and co-wrote some of the Heads to Heads for Alas Smith and Jones. In 1993, they left Spitting Image and became the first writers credited for the scripted parts of Have I Got News For You . Also for Hat Trick Productions they wrote a BBC1 sitcom The Peter Principle starring Jim Broadbent (known as The Boss in the US).[ citation needed ]
The pair are credited for 'additional dialogue' for the Aardman film Chicken Run , but after a decade of collaboration, Burton and O'Farrell began to work on separate projects. Although he continued to do some TV comedy scriptwriting (with credits for 2DTV, Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Mike Bassett: Manager ) Burton began to focus on screenwriting, most notably with the DreamWorks Animation Madagascar . Other major screenplay credits include Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (which won an Oscar in 2006 for Best Animated Feature Film), Gnomeo and Juliet and Aliens in the Attic . He adapted the novel of his former writing partner for the ITV film 'May Contain Nuts' and also wrote and produced the BBC short film One of those Days. He also wrote and made his directorial debut with Richard Starzak with Shaun the Sheep Movie , which got nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. He would later return to write its sequel A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon with Jon Brown, based on a story by Starzak.
Burton is a musician and songwriter, having composed the music for the comedy rock musical The Next Big Thing which he wrote and produced with Pete Sinclair.[ citation needed ] He also shares the credit for the original music in 'One of Those Days' and has written songs and parodies for a number of radio shows.[ citation needed ]
Clive Stuart Anderson is an English television and radio presenter, comedy writer, and former barrister. Winner of a British Comedy Award in 1991, Anderson began experimenting with comedy and writing comedic scripts during his 15-year legal career, before starring in Whose Line Is It Anyway? on BBC Radio 4, then later Channel 4. He has also hosted many radio programmes, and made guest appearances on Have I Got News for You, Mock the Week and QI.
Geoffrey Howard Perkins was a British comedy producer, writer and performer. Best known as the BBC head of comedy (1995–2001), he produced the first two radio series of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and is one of the people credited with creating the bizarre panel game Mornington Crescent for I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue. In December 2008 he posthumously received an Outstanding Contribution to Comedy Award.
John Docherty is a Scottish writer, actor, presenter and producer.
John O'Farrell is a British author, comedy scriptwriter, and political campaigner. Previously a lead writer for such shows as Spitting Image and Have I Got News for You, he is now best known as a comic author for such books such as The Man Who Forgot His Wife and An Utterly Impartial History of Britain. He is one of a small number of British writers to have achieved best-seller status with both fiction and nonfiction. He has also published three collections of his weekly column for The Guardian and set up Britain's first daily satirical news website NewsBiscuit. With comedian Angela Barnes, he co-hosts the light-hearted historical podcast We Are History.
Dick Clement is an English writer, director and producer. He became known for his writing partnership with Ian La Frenais for television series including The Likely Lads, Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?, Porridge, Lovejoy and Auf Wiedersehen, Pet.
John Sparkes is a Welsh actor and comedian. He portrayed Barry Welsh, presenter of the HTV Wales series Barry Welsh Is Coming. He has also had major roles in Naked Video, Absolutely, Fireman Sam, Shaun the Sheep, and Jeff Global's Global Probe, and is the narrator of the children's television show Peppa Pig.
Karey Kirkpatrick is an American screenwriter, film director, and producer. His films include Chicken Run, The Rescuers Down Under, James and the Giant Peach,Over the Hedge, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Charlotte's Web, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He has also directed the films Over the Hedge,Imagine That starring Eddie Murphy as well as Smallfoot. Kirkpatrick wrote the English-language screenplays for the U.S. releases of the Studio Ghibli films The Secret World of Arrietty in 2012 and From Up on Poppy Hill in 2013.
Robert Darren Popper is a British comedy producer, writer, actor, and author, best known as co-creator of the mock BBC documentary Look Around You, and creator of Channel 4's sitcom Friday Night Dinner. He also wrote the books The Timewaster Letters, Return of The Timewaster Letters and The Timewaster Diaries under the pseudonym Robin Cooper.
Loose Ends is a British radio programme originally broadcast on Saturday mornings, and then transmitted early Saturday evenings from 1998 by BBC Radio 4. It was hosted by Ned Sherrin until 2006 and has been hosted by Clive Anderson, Nikki Bedi and Peter Curran since 2007. The programme brings together guests, generally from the world of entertainment, in a mix of interviews, sets by comedians and musical sessions.
Kevin Robert Cecil is a British screenwriter.
Shaun the Sheep is a British stop-motion animated silent comedy children's television series and a spin-off of the Wallace and Gromit franchise. The title character is Shaun, a sheep who previously appeared in the 1995 short film A Close Shave and the Shopper 13 short film from the 2002 Wallace and Gromit's Cracking Contraptions series. The series focuses on his adventures on a northern English farm as the leader of his flock.
Richard Starzak, previously known as Richard "Golly" Goleszowski, is an English animator, screenwriter, and film director.
A Look Back At The Nineties was a British comedy radio series first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1993. Presented by Brian Perkins, the 5 episodes were a spoof look back at the years 1995 to 1999 from the standpoint of New Year's Eve 1999. Each 30 minute episode covered one year.
Christopher Sadler is a British animator, director and writer. He is primarily known for his work on Wallace and Gromit, Chicken Run, Rex the Runt, Cracking Contraptions, Creature Comforts and Shaun the Sheep.
Laurence Peter Rowley, better known as Laurie Rowley was an English comedy writer from Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire. He is most famous for a sketch writer, working on shows such as The Two Ronnies and Not the Nine O'Clock News, for which he wrote the "Darts" sketch, which satirised the heavy drinking habits of darts players at the time.
Shaun the Sheep Movie is a 2015 stop-motion animated adventure comedy film written and directed by Richard Starzak and Mark Burton. It is based on the British television series Shaun the Sheep, in turn a spin-off of the Wallace and Gromit film A Close Shave (1995). Starring the voices of Justin Fletcher, John Sparkes, and Omid Djalili, the film follows Shaun and his flock navigating the big city to save their amnesiac farmer, while an overzealous animal control worker pursues the group. It was produced by Aardman Animations, and financed by StudioCanal in association with Anton Capital Entertainment.
The 36th Boston Society of Film Critics Awards, honoring the best in filmmaking in 2015, were given on December 11, 2015.
A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon is a 2019 stop-motion animated science fiction comedy film produced by Aardman Animations. The film is directed by Richard Phelan and Will Becher and written by Mark Burton and Jon Brown, based on an idea by Richard Starzak. It is a stand-alone sequel to Shaun the Sheep Movie (2015) and is based on the claymation television series Shaun the Sheep, a spinoff from the Wallace and Gromit short film A Close Shave. It is the first sequel ever made by Aardman and in stop-motion in general. The film stars Justin Fletcher, John Sparkes, Kate Harbour, and Rich Webber reprising their voice roles from the series and the previous film, whilst new cast members include Amalia Vitale, David Holt and Chris Morrell. In the film, Shaun and the flock encounter a cute alien with extraordinary powers, who crash-lands near Mossy Bottom Farm. They have to find a way to return her home in order to prevent her falling into the hands of the Ministry for Alien Detection.