A Grand Success!: The Aardman Journey, One Frame at a Time

by Peter Lord, David Sproxton, Nick Park

Aardman Animations was founded in 1972 by Peter Lord and David Sproxton. Joined by animator Nick Park in 1985, Aardman pioneered a quirky, lovable style of stop-motion animation and is behind a string of unforgettable award-winning hits including Chicken Run, the highest-grossing stop-animated film of all time, and the Wallace & Gromit series.
 
With A Grand Success!, Lord, Sproxton, and Park tell the inside story of the 45-year history of Aardman. From their first short films, made on a lark on their kitchen table, to advertisements and music videos, A Grand Success! recounts the adventures and challenges of developing their own unique style, growing their business, working with famous actors, and conquering Hollywood, all while animating at 24 painstaking moves per second. This is a charming and insightful must-read for all fans of animation.

Genres: Nonfiction, Art, Humor, Film, British Literature, History

368 pages, Hardcover

First published January 15, 2019

About the author

Peter Lord, CBE (born 4 November 1953) is an English animator, film producer, director and co-founder of the Academy Award-winning Aardman Animations studio, an animation firm best known for its clay-animated films and shorts, particularly those featuring plasticine duo Wallace and Gromit. He also directed The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists! which was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the 85th Academy Awards.

Lord is the executive producer of every Aardman work, including Chicken Run, Arthur Christmas, and Flushed Away.

Reviews

[Cordelia Cosier · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you’re looking for a detailed making-of for Aardman’s vast catalogue, you wont find it here. As the cover of this book states, this is “an autobiography” of the company behind the characters. It’s the story of two childhood friends, David Sproxton and Peter Lord, who turned their ersatz hobby into an award-winning film studio.

David Gritten has compiled extensive interviews with the pair to chronicle the rise of their company across the decades. From their humble beginnings making the Morph shorts to world-renowned feature films, Gritten has spoken to Nick Park and all of the major players to tell the complete story of Aardman.

Hollywood narratives tend to be full of clashes of creativity and bitter rivalries, but, unsurprisingly for a company that’s always been something of an outlier, there’s little of that here. There aren’t really any major animosities or grievances - but don’t think this is a tale that lacks drama! There’s something heartening about two kind people entering a cutthroat world without compromising their values. Throughout the growth of the company, Lord and Sproxton never lose their social conscience or their sense of fun. Clearly, the works of Aardman are and continue to be a labour of love for all involved and that shines through on every page. Full of laugh out loud moments, this is definitely worth a read if you’re a fan of their work. (And let’s face it, who isn’t?)

[Stephen Hardy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was just as delightful as any of Aardman's films. A lovely look at the history of Aardman films through their highs and lows. Peter Lord, Nick Park & David Sproxton enthusiasm for animation is infectious. Book goes into just enough details, but probably needs a bit of extra editing as a few time they end up using some of the quotes from interviews twice.

[C.J. Bunce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Originally published November 27, 2019, at BORG.com.

A Grand Success!–Aardman team recounts journey to Oscar-winning stop-motion animation

Review by C.J. Bunce

You may not know it, but you probably first met them in their record-breaking music video that they pulled together in only two weeks for Peter Gabriel’s song, Sledgehammer. It’s a story of two teenagers borrowing mom’s old kitchen table to use to film their Plasticine creations. Flash forward a few years and their multiple Oscar-winning company is negotiating for big-budget real estate for their movie studio. The company is Aardman Animations, named for the star character of their earliest film. And the founders are Peter Lord and David Sproxton, who have documented their journey in this year’s latest chronicle of the history of animation, A Grand Success! The Aardman Journey, One Frame at a Time, now available from Abrams Press.

It’s not just a biography of the two boys who would see their company bring home four Oscars and even more nominations and BAFTAs. A Grand Success! (the title a play on their first Oscar-nominated adventure, A Grand Day Out) is a time capsule of those key intersections of effort, skill, perseverance, and happenstance, that can make any endeavor a success. The efforts of the small British upstart found their footing in both the worlds of fantasy film and advertising. One put the food on the table until, like many creators, they could focus on their passions. And although they didn’t sever their ties with commercial work, they created what are now among the most recognized characters in England and the world outside the United States (and their U.S. following isn’t too bad, either). Before long their ideas had them sealing big deals with the likes of Jeffrey Katzenberg and Steven Spielberg, and having actors from Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter, Hugh Grant, Eddie Redmayne, Maisie Williams, and Tom Hiddleston–the cream of Britain’s acting talent– providing the voices of their characters.

Read the rest of the review here at BORG.

[Bob Mackey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Aardman autobiography is an indispensable resource for any fans of the British animation studio, or just animation in general. Though I feel a little selfish in thinking it could be a little better. To fully do Aardman and its nearly 50 years justice, you'd need multiple volumes—preferably one for each decade. And while I'd love to see that, I realize from a capitalist standpoint it's just not reasonable—so I'll shelve this particular complaint.

So now it's time for more reasonable criticisms. Is it weird to say I'd like more pages devoted to the actual making of each film and short? I realize a number of these projects deserve entire books—and some have gotten them—but it's odd that so many notable Aardman creations get a handful of pages, while their building receives an entire chapter. (Am I suddenly reading The Hunchback of Notre Dame?) Also, I realize the book is essentially PR for the studio, but some of the chapters, like the one on their admittedly admirable charity work, feel like I just clicked through to the "about" section on their website.

Still, there are lots of great stories within, and this autobiography really explores the distinct personalities and sensibilities of Aardman honchos Lord, Sproxton, and Park. I'd like to believe they're truly as kind and driven as the book portrays, and something tells me they actually are.

[Michaela · Rating 2 out of 5]

---Full disclosure: I received this book for free from Goodreads. --- Geez, this was dull. The beginning was okay, when it discussed the creative childhood friendship of two boys, & their interesting families. After they left school though, this was a slog. The writing was the problem. Good Lord this was f'ing dry. There are grammar problems, limited vocabulary, & misused words. It needs a new author. The info. is all there if someone wants to re-do this thing. It'd be worth the doing. Hard-skimmed most everything after college & quit at p.234. As it currently stands I unfortunately can't recommend it, which is just a shame. ----- Maybe 1.5 stars.

[˗ˏˋ maddie ˊˎ˗ · Rating 4 out of 5]

I definitely feel like this was an incredibly strange way to write an autobiography but it was interesting to find out how much of the success of the business has been luck, ethos, passion, and just plain keeping your nose to the grindstone.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Will Watt absolutely nails the narration of the Aardman story, and I am so glad that I now know all of these delightful tidbits about Peter, David, Nick, and everything that they’ve made and built together. Bravo chaps!

[Darren Vogt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aardman is my absolute favorite animation studio working right now - and this story reinforces that. Seeing how they went from animation enthusiasts working on small-scale projects on basically a kitchen table, to a company making multiple feature films, commercials, and other work using one of the most arduous, labor-intensive processes in animation is inspiring. It especially cements their legendary status to see how humble and how down to earth the people at Aardman seem to be, even though they have run-ins with Hollywood types and enjoy an international appeal.

The book is inspiring and warm, and features an intricate look into the story of the studio, one that I'm happy to have been let in on, even just a little.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

A biography of the Aardman brand, more than anything, this starts with a potted history of Peter Lord & David Sproxton (childhood friends) and runs right up to 2018, when the book was published. As a long-time fan of Aardman, I was really looking forward to this but while it does provide some interesting titbits and facts, it misses a lot too. Most of this, I think, is down to the light chummy which prevents it from being incisive - some things, like the early successful film “Down And Out”, seem almost like an accident in that we don’t get to know how they worked out the animation, or synced the voices, or even why they made the choices they did. The same with “Morph”, it’s presented as “this happened and it was successful”, without really examining why or how it came into being. This continues, but then towards the end we get a lot of information about recent charity links and how they built the building. In addition, there’s quite a bit of repetition and it’s there from the start, with lots of pieces from the lengthy prologue salted through the first couple of chapters. Good for the casual reader, there’s an in-depth biography to be written about Aardman but unfortunately, this isn’t it.

[Jude Walko · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a huge fan of stop motion animation, I loved this book more than most might. Regardless, it is an amazing story of a couple of Bristol kids starting what would eventually become the most well known animation brand in the UK and one of the most recognized in the world.

The best part is that even though they found success early and often, they never stepped away from their core values. Whether that be trying to keep people employed, not sacrificing passion to turn a profit, or being instrumental in scores of millions of pounds sterling to charity.

These guys stayed close to their roots, contributed to the community, and the whole time managed to churn out award winning products and create internationally celebrated intellectual properties in the form of endearing characters like Wallace & Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and Morph to name a few.

Their collection of BAFTAs, Oscars, CBEs and heaps of accolades pale in comparison to the work ethic, community contributions and creativity of Peter Lord, David Sproxton, Nick Park, Richard "Golly" Starzak and many others.

[LeAnn · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I love stop motion animation and am a huge fan of books about the creative process, I think I should have had more of an interest in Aardman Animations prior to picking up this book. The only work of theirs I've actually seen is Chicken Run and the 'Sledgehammer' music video. I felt that this book was more geared towards the hardcore fans of the company. It was also to timeline-y for my taste. Instead of, oh this happened in 1976 and then they did this in 1978, I would have been more interested if the book if it flowed like a story. I also found it to be too repetitive. The same information was presented several times throughout the book, and I actually found one spot where the exact same quote was used within a few paragraphs of each other.

Overall, not something I thoroughly enjoyed or would pick up again. Though if you have followed their career from the beginning, and have more knowledge of their works, I think you'd enjoy it more.

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, but ultimately a bit disappointing, ramble through the history of Aardman Animation. And I do mean "ramble" -- this exploration of the company and its history (ostensibly by its two original founds) has lots of interest bits and pieces, but the focus of the book seems to ramble back and forth, oftentimes covering ground it has already covered, even including the same quotes in various places.

I enjoyed it, generally, and learned a lot about the background of the company and the production of many of its iconic films, but the book itself could have used a stronger editorial hand to make the writing sharper and less of an aimless stroll.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am a massive fan of Aardman and I really enjoyed the extra insight this book gave me into the company. I found it a really enjoyable read and although the way it was written was a bit weird, I am super glad I picked it up.

I liked the fact it covered both the good bits and the bad bits and even though I knew some of the things that were covered in the book from seeing other documentaries, I still feel like I learned a lot of things I didn't know before. Even though I am generally not a massive nonfiction fan, I enjoyed this thoroughly and was super sad when I had finished it.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful read to get to know the creators of Aardman and to get an inside scoop on the brass tacks of their determination in realizing the working of their imaginations, all the while keeping their business close-knit and in the same community no matter how fame touched them.

An excellent read well-worth recommending!
I look forward to what's next in Aardman's chapter.
Thank you Abrams Books for my copy.

[Ramona · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fun read. As a lover of claymation, the unusual, and humorous but clean movies, this was a treat to read. I enjoyed reading about one of my favorites...the creators of Wallace and Grommit! Most of us don't realize the work that goes into creating even a short film. Pixar shorts are great! So, sit down, get comfortable and dig into the genius, how this art form got started, the trials and the accomplishments, that gave us all the great, humorous shorts that are timeless.

[Thebruce1314 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Based on the quality of the company’s work and their organizational values, five stars without question. The book itself is very easy to read, but not always exciting. The book really centres mainly on the careers of Lord and Sproxton, who are the founders of Aardman. Inspiring, if not always an enthralling read.

[Arthur · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great summary of the life of Aardman and how each memorable character became a household name. Pictures are included in the middle and highlights from many celebrities who have worked with Aardman, such as Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Grant.

Book had a few spelling mistakes.

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A biography of Aardman Adventures the home of Wallace and Grommit. It seems to have been done in house and could have used an editor, but over all one gets the sense of what happened to make the company a success. Start with good people and go from there.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a charming book. It sat on my shelf for too many years. When I was looking for my nest read I’d skim the spine of this one and think “no, how interesting can it be?”
An absolute gem awaited. Give it a go!

[Emily W · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was 100% a special interest read, and it was really interesting to learn more about the history of Aardman. There were multiple instances though where the books seemed to repeat what it had already said on the previous page—probably could have been edited down a bit!

[Raven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved this book and all the photos ❤️

[Adam Vincent-Garland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful

[Ben Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting book although the early days are where all the great stories are. It feels such a joyous period of creating.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a FUN Book to read and listen too. I grew up watching the old Wallace & Gromit videos and what great storytelling it is. I wonder what next Wallace and Gromit film is going to look like.

[Karl O' · Rating 4 out of 5]

An easy read. I’m hosting The Wrong Trousers for a film group discussion so this was exactly the amount of information I needed. Light & frothy . A cracking good tale.

[Callum · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cracking book gromit

[Arran Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty solid entertaining read.

[L · Rating 4 out of 5]

Getting my non-fiction quota in for the year.

I adore Aardman; if you’re not a hardcore fan, you probably won’t appreciate this book.

[Matt Jex · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aardman sure seems like a funny place