PSYCHOTOWN on FX!

Well, we’ve been absent from these here News pages for almost exactly a year. Funny that, because it took almost exactly a year to make our brand new series of PSYCHOTOWN, which is gonna premiere on US cable channel FX this September!

Coupla articles announcing the new late night animated block Cake which our show will be part of:
Deadline
Cartoon Brew

The show has been produced by Backseat Rebel and animator Dave Carter’s sister company, the elusive Channel Plarb, and made here in Sydney by a crack team of hard slog animators, tiny set builders and the usual gang of idiots doing the voices.

Cannot wait for y’all to see it.

BIN CHICKENS funded for long-form development!

Our show Bin Chickens has just received some development funding thanks to Screen Australia!

After releasing three short pilot episodes last year via ABC TV's Fresh Blood program, we were inundated with great responses - so we're excited to to turn the show into a full-length ram-raid on the way our city treats its inhabitants, be they avian, human or anything in between. 

Check out the interviews Nikos did with Garry Maddox in The Sydney Morning Herald as well as the pow-wow on ABC radio with James Valentine below!

Fish with Legs gets a Vimeo Staff Pick!

Our short animated film Fish with Legs has finally premiered online thanks to a Vimeo Staff Pick!

After an 18-month long festival run, including playing opening night of both Flickerfest and St Kilda Film Festivals and taking home the gong for Best Animation at the former, the film is at last available for all to watch. We are stoked.

Starring the voices of Frank Woodley and Barry Otto, with an award-winning score by Matteo Zingales of Sonar, the film is some of animator/director Dave Carter's best work and definitely one of my favourite pieces of...er...my own scriptwriting. 

Check it! https://vimeo.com/channels/staffpicks/274326838

United Screens of Oz

Thanks to Screen Australia, BSR's Nikos Andronicos and longtime creative partner, animator Dave Carter, just spent a month in the US to check up on production of their upcoming FX series Psychotown, hit the pitch circuit with a new project in LA, and spend a week in New York as part of the Talent USA program, attending the Australian International Screen Forum and meeting with Stateside industry folk galore.

Carter and Andronicos have started a dedicated animation company called Channel Plarb, through which Psychotown and future animated projects will be run. We're pumped about it.

BSR x The Chaser x Sammy J x ABC

It's been a busy summer for BSR, with ABCTV releasing three pilot episodes of our animated show Bin Chickens, Nikos directing slabs of The Chaser's consumer affairs comedy The Checkout and the new political satire sketch series Sammy J, and a trip to Shanghai to gather artwork for our new animated show Sweatland that is currently being shopped in the US. 

Bin Chickens - a show about 3 ibises fighting the authorities in Sydney's Darling Harbour - hit a note with viewers online, proving once again that people are warming to the much-maligned garbage-eating city birds. You know they're native, right? 

The Checkout, now in its 6th season, covered everything from fake craft beers to how to test if a battery is flat without putting it in the same appliance 20 times "just to make sure".

And Sammy J, stepping into the Thursday night slot slot recently vacated by legendary political humorists John Clarke and Brian Dawe, has been a baptism of fire for all concerned in production - filmed on Wednesday, edited Thursday and on-air Thursday night. 

Great experiences all.

TippyTappy Sports smashes the Ashes for Optus Sport

Satrical sports journalists TippyTappy Sports, aka Damien Timms and Backseat Rebel's Nikos Andronicos, have been given carte blanche by Optus Sport to get stuck into the upcoming Ashes cricket series from more angles than Mitchell Starc with the new ball.

TippyTappy content for the series (produced by Backseat Rebel) includes STRAIGHT TALK (a rolling series of muckraking interviews with the current Australian squad) and GREAT MOMENTS IN ASHES HISTORY (an archival/interview documentary series that takes the piss out of said great moments as hard as humanly possible).

All the TTS output will be viewable on Optus Sport's Ashes Cricket platform throughout the Australian summer.

Bin Chickens is FINISHED!

Our new adult animated show BIN CHICKENS is mixed, graded and delivered, now the waiting game begins for its release on ABC TV and iView as part of the Fresh Blood 2017 anthology.

Created by BSR's Nikos Andronicos and brother-in-arms collaborator Dave Carter, the show follows 3 ibises as they try to make a go of it in the jewel in Sydney's crown, Darling Harbour. 

We promise that once you've watched the 3 pilot episodes you will not only look at these maligned birds very differently, you may even want to become one yourself. 

BSR to produce ABC/Triple J sitcom collab "Jays of Our Lives"

We're producing a brand new scripted short-form series for ABC TV, set in the backrooms and corridors of Triple J. 

Created by and starring JJJ drive hosts Veronica Milsom & Lewis Hobba and directed by BSR's Nikos Andronicos, Jays of our Lives is a 5-parter about the daily carnival of chaos that goes on at the national youth broadcaster when the mics are off (and sometimes on). 

Plenty of guest talent including international pop superstar Halsey, Oz dance kings Peking Duk, garage rockers Dune Rats, rapper Illy, comedian Matt Okine and Walkley-award winning journalist David Marr. 

Stay tuned for release deets.

Growing Up Gracefully premieres tonight on ABC1!

Nikos recently jumped on board the Chaser-produced Growing Up Gracefully as co-director, and the comedic documentary TV series premieres nationally tonight on ABC1 and iView.

Written and presented by the brave and talented sister duo Hannah and Eliza Reilly, the show is a satirical investigation into the ridiculous advice women have been given over the past century on how they should "grow up...whatever the f-k that means".

Episode 1 sees Hannah teaching etiquette guru June Dally-Watkins how to scull a beer and Eliza being half-drowned in the Bondi breakers as she learns how to Insta-pose.

Very funny stuff. 

Fish with Legs wins Best Original Score at St Kilda

Our animated short Fish with Legs took home the gong for Best Original Score at the 2017 St Kilda Film Festival awards last night.

The film was scored by the outrageously talented Matteo Zingales at Sydney's Sonar Music. Matteo tapped into Tchaikovsky, Debussy, Joe Hisaishi and South Pacific traditionals to come up with a flippin' awesome soundtrack for our fish fable. 

Fish with Legs wins at Flickerfest, opens St Kilda

Our animated short film FISH WITH LEGS goes from strength to strength on the festival circuit!

After a world premiere at the Anima Mundi International Animation Festival in Brazil, the film has recently scored opening night slots at both of Australia's leading short film festivals: Flickerfest (Sydney) and St Kilda (Melbourne) and went on to pick up the award for Best Australian Animation at Flickerfest. 

BSR goes full ibis in new ABC series BIN CHICKENS

Together with animating genius and blood brother Dave Carter, Backseat Rebel is producing BIN CHICKENS for ABC TV and iView, after being selected for funding as part of Screen Australia's Fresh Blood initiative.

The 3-part animated comedy follows the adventures of three ibises who live life to the max in the jewel of Sydney's crown, Darling Harbour. Perhaps the most maligned and misunderstood animal in Australia, the garbage-scavenging, picnic-stealing ibis is well overdue for a sympathetic makeover, and BIN CHICKENS promises to deliver. 

Voiced by comedians Sam Campbell, Veronica Milsom and Dave Eastgate, the series is directed by Dave Carter and written by Nikos Andronicos and will be released in mid 2017.

Vindalosers clears the boundary on Triple M

In association with sports satire collective TippyTappy Sports, Backseat Rebel has produced VINDALOSERS, a 30 minute documentary that explores why the Australian cricket team gets routinely trounced in India...and what they need to do to win. 

The doco, which premiers on SCA/Triple M's digital assets nationwide in February 2017, follows TippyTappy's Damien Timms and Nikos Andronicos as they journey around the subcontinent in search of Indian insights, intel and what could only be described as "immersion learning", playing cricket against every man, woman and child they can convince to roll the arm over. (Spoiler: it doesn't take much convincing). 

Watch it here!

BSR's Nikos Andronicos tapped to co-direct WHAM BAM

Sydney comedy trio and viral sensations Skitbox have brought Backseat Rebel's Nikos Andronicos on board to co-direct their debut full-length TV comedy series Wham Bam Thankyou Ma'am.

Locked for broadcast by ABCTV in Australia and NBC/Seeso in the US, the 6 x 30 minute series by the team behind Activewear is a sketch show that dissects modern gender roles with an extremely sharp scalpel. 

Andronicos will direct a number of recurring segments including the already cult sitcom parody Boys Will Be Boys.

Fish with Legs completed!

Our Screen Australia-commissioned animated short FIsh with Legs has finally been put to bed! 

Directed by Dave Carter, written by Nikos Andronicos and starring the voices of Barry Otto and Frank Woodley, the film was shepherded through its epic production phase by animating powerhouses Candy Burger and Rubber House Studio, given a transformative score by Matteo Zingales, and sonically landscaped by Luke Mynott at Sonar. 

We are absolutely stoked with the finished product and cannot wait to get it out there. 

Watch this space for screening updates! (Or if you just can't wait, bribe us for a private link)

Crazy Bastards shortlisted for two OVAs!

Our iView comedy series Crazy Bastards has just been nominated for two gongs as part of the Online Video Awards, Australia's premier comp for digital content creators. 

Crazy Bs is up for Best Comedy and Best Performance (for our star Justin Heazlewood, aka postmodernity's #1 comedian The Bedroom Philosopher). Great to see 1980s advertising humour recognised by the powers that be. 

Check out the official shortlist and all the episodes are viewable right here.