DreamWorks Flushes Away Partnership with Aardman Posted: Feb 01, 2007

The deal original set for five movies only lasted through the delivery of three movies: Chicken Run, Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-rabbit, and Flushed Away. Aardman was already working on its fourth movie for DreamWorks, Crood Awakening, at the time the deal was cancelled. Both companies sought to soften the blow in a joint press release where they praised each other.

"I have had the pleasure and privilege of working with Peter Lord, David Sproxton, Nick Park and the Aardman team for almost ten years and highly respect their storytelling and filmmaking talents," said Jeffrey Katzenberg, chief executive officer of DreamWorks Animation. "I am proud of the work we have created together and also greatly admire Aardman's passion and expertise for stop motion filmmaking and brilliant storytelling."

Katzenberg says that the deal was cancelled because DreamWorks has “a full film slate laid out into 2010” which already includes two animated CGI movies from its DreamWorks Animation division.

Aardman Animations confirmed that their business priorities were moving apart.

"We've enjoyed a hugely successful and creative relationship with Jeffrey and DreamWorks Animation," stated Peter Lord and David Sproxton, co-owners of Aardman Animations, "but both companies are aware that our ambitions have moved apart, and it feels like the right time to move on. Aardman has an ambitious slate of feature film projects in development and we will announce our future production and distribution plans shortly."

DreamWorks had an exclusive animation deal with Aardman Animation for releasing Aardman’s animated feature films. Chicken Run was a huge success, but both Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-rabbit and Flushed Away had disappointing numbers. Flushed Away, released in November 2006, made only $63.5 million at the box office. Contrast that to Warner Bros. Happy Feet (released a few weeks after Flushed Away), which grossed more than $192 million at the box office.

It is unknown what will happen to the fourth film Aardman Animations was working on for DreamWorks, Crood Awakening. Set in the Stone Age, Crood Awakening is a comedy about a big man in a small village called Crood. His position as Leader of the Hunt is threatened by the arrival of a prehistoric genius who comes up with revolutionary new inventions ... like fire. John Cleese, who earned an Academy Award nomination for his screenplay for A Fish Called Wanda, wrote the script for Crood Awakening.