Aardman co-founders Peter Lord and David Sproxton, the company’s star director and Executive Creative Director Sarah Cox hit the Annecy International Animation Film Festival on Sunday for a masterclass celebrating the studio’s 50th anniversary.

There were plenty of anecdotes but the 90-minute talk also looked to the present and future of the award-winning studio behind stop-motion box office break out Chicken Run; Oscar-winner Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit and the Shaun The Sheep series among many beloved films and shows.

Cox took the opportunity to announce the BBC-commissioned stop-motion and 2D animated series Let’s Go Timmy! set against the backdrop of Mossy Bottom.

The 30 x 5 minutes episodes sees Bitzer the sheep dog tasked with getting Timmy and his two best friends, Yabba and Apricot, to Mossy Bottom School safe and on time each morning against the odds, with the group regularly side-tracked on route.  

The series is directed by Merlin Crossingham and Daniel Bins and produced by Stephanie Miller with Lucy Pryke, the Commissioning Executive for the BBC.

Cox also revealed new production The Almost (Untold) Story Of Danger Delilah, adapted from Once Upon an Alphabet by Oliver Jeffers.

“We’re coming towards the end of our development phase… we’re working very excitingly with an Irish illustrator and writer, Oliver Jeffers, taking some of his characters from his alphabet stories,” said Cox.

She said Lord, Aardman director Åsa Lukander, Senior Development Executive James Higginson had created “a whole new story” from the book and its characters.

“The script is by Pete. It’s about Danger Delilah, a girl who realises her world’s starting to disappear and then that she is a character in someone else’s story that they’re forgetting about… So she has to literally seize the narrative and rewrite her own story. We’ve just finished a phase of development, so we’ll be ready to start pitching it soon,” said Cox.

In other project updates, Cox was joined on stage by Phil Rynda, Director of Original Animation at The Pokémon Company Internationa,l to talk about their previously announced joint project Pokémon Tales: The Misadventures of Sirfetch’d & Pichu and reveal never-before-seen footage of the protagonists.

Rynda also revealed that the adventure will unfold Pokémon’s Galar region, which shares many geographical similarities with the real-world of the UK.

John Early’s Maddie’s Secret from Magnolia Pictures is cooking at IFC Center in New York with a $58.2k weekend, the biggest opening in more than two years at the arthouse. Gregg Allman: The Music Of My Soul, the inaugural theatrical release of new distributor Subtex, is eyeing $375k on 199 screens for the five days through Sunday.

Maddie’s Secret is also the 6^th biggest opener ever at the IFC with Early on hand for multiple sold-out Q&A shows moderated by John Wilson, Sarah Sherman, Julio Torres, Ivy Wolk, Theda Hammel, Brace Belden and Amy Sedaris — “with each selling out almost as soon as it was announced, building into at-capacity screenings all weekend long,” said IFC Center SVP and GM Harris Dew. He said the opening was driven by younger theatergoers.

“I am so touched by all the beautiful New Yorkers coming out to meet Maddie this weekend,” said Early, who has been on a months-long promotional tour. “It’s especially meaningful for it to be happening at the IFC Center where I first saw Showgirls when I was 18.”

Maddie premiered at TIFF, played New York’s New Directors/New Films and Opening Night of L.A. ‘s Los Angeles Festival of Movies followed by a robust regional festival tour. Expands to L.A. next week with Early on hand for Q&As at AMC Americana at Brand, AMC Burbanknand Laemmle Santa Monica. Additional cities will follow on July 3.

Comedian Early stars as Maddie, a dishwasher who leaps to viral superstardom at a trendy food content creation company but mounting professional pressures reawaken her long dormant struggle with an eating disorder and she quietly unravels. With Eric Rahill as adoring husband, Kate Berland as best friend and ‘80s-inspired score from frequent Early musical collaborator Michael Hesslein.

EVENT: Gregg Allman: The Music Of My Soul was initially slated as a one night event but theaters across the country added encore shows due to demand. Directed by James Keach (Glenn Campbell: I’ll Be Me) and produced by longtime Greg Allman manager Michael Lehman, the film features a 100% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Reflecting Allman’s widespread popularity, top engagements were all over the map including the Lucas Theatre in Savannah, Piedmont Opera House in Macon, the Belcourt in Nashville, the Basie Center in Red Bank, NJ, the North Park in Buffalo, the Tara in Atlanta, and the Burns Court in Sarasota.

The film’s showing “reinforces our belief that theatrical remains a powerful platform for music-driven films and passionate fan communities. We built Subtext to live where film and music meet, and the response to Gregg Allman: The Music of My Soul validates that vision,” said the distrib’s Danielle DiGiacomo. The doc will remain in select theaters this week leading into a national encore next Saturday and Sunday.

LIMITED: Rose Of Nevada from 1-2 Special debuted to $25k at 3 theaters. Director Mark Jenkin continues a Q&A tour this week with upcoming stops at Jacob Burns Film Center (Pleasantville, NY) on 6/22, Coolidge Corner (Brookline, MA) on 6/23, AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center (Silver Spring, MD) on 6/24, The Oriental Theater (Milwaukee, WI) on 6/25 (presented in 35mm) and The Music Box (Chicago, IL) on 6/26 (35mm). The film starring George MacKay and Callum Turner expands in New York and Los Angeles and opens in San Francisco, Chicago, DC, and Seattle next week with the platform release continuing through July. It’s 100% with RT critics.

Greenwich Entertainment opened Peter Asher: Everywhere Man exclusively at NYC’s Quad Cinema where it was the top film in the complex with an estimated $9.5k. The life story of Peter Asher — British Invasion pop star, producer, manager, and confidant to legends — across six decades at the heart of rock and roll history premiered at Telluride. By Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine (Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song; The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden), it features footage and interviews with James Taylor, Linda Ronstadt, Carole King, Paul McCartney, Steve Martin, Eric Idle, Robin Williams, Lyle Lovett, Natalie Merchant, Twiggy, Pattie Boyd, Marianne Faithfull, Paul Shaffer, Gordon Waller, Rufus Wainwright, and “Weird Al” Yankovic. Expands to LA, the San Francisco Bay Area, and additional markets next week.

MODERATE: Coming-of age story Girls Like Girls from Focus Features grossed a solid $1.6 million at 504 theaters. The film by Hayley Kiyoko, based on her hit single and best-selling novel of the same name, sits at 89% from RT Critics and a 91% with the audience.

WIDE: Neon’s Leviticus, the first feature by Adrian Chiarella, debuted at $2.75 million on 1,076 screens. Two teenage boys (Joe Bird and Stacy Clausen) must escape a violent entity that takes the form of a person they desire the most — each other. Mia Wasikowska also stars.

Michael Sarnoski’s The Death of Robin Hood from A24 opened to $2.6 million on 1,762 screens. Shot in 35mm and starring Hugh Jackman the drama reimagines the final days of the legendary outlaw. With Jodie Comer, Bill Skarsgård and Murray Bartlett.