Windy Miller back to sow his oats | Media | The Guardian
Windy Miller back to sow his oats
Windy Miller: popular children's character has been updated for the modern age
Friday 16 September 2005 02.32 EDT
First published on Friday 16 September 2005 02.32 EDT
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Windy Miller, one of the characters from classic children's show Camberwick Green, is making a comeback nearly 40 years after his first TV appearance to advertise the benefits of eating porridge.
The jovial puppet, who lived in Colley's Mill just outside the idyllic village of Camberwick Green, is appearing in a pair of adverts for Quaker Oats.
But he will be slightly racier than the placid character viewers will remember whittling wood and whistling for the wind.
Rather than enjoying cider and avoiding the sails of his windmill as he did in the original series, he will be shown eating porridge, admiring a pretty jogger and perking up at the sight of a barmaid driving by - signs, according to the ad-makers, that he is "sowing his oats".
Windy's mill has been decked out with a Quaker Oats sign, while the company's brand is also featured on a bag of oats.
The ads have been voiced by The Fast Show's Charlie Higson, although the show's original narrator, Brian Cant, was also auditioned for the job.
New puppets and backdrops had to be created by for the adverts by special effects company Artem, the outfit behind the BBC's digital monkeys and the Churchill Insurance puppet dog.
Camberwick Green's creator Gordon Murray had destroyed the originals in a bonfire after the last transmission.
The new ads were produced by Loose Moose for the Abbott Mead Vickers advertising agency.
Windy Miller was one of the most popular characters in Camberwick Green, which was shown on BBC1 between January and March 1966.
It was the first in Gordon Murray's stop-motion animation Trumptonshire trilogy, appearing before Trumpton (1967) and Chigley (1969) as part of BBC1's Watch with Mother strand.
Third-party rights for the Windy Miller character are now owned by Entertainment Rights, the company behind Postman Pat and Basil Brush.
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