Interview with Producers and joint Managing Directors of Lupus Films Ruth Fielding and Camilla Deakin

12 December 2023

After The Tiger Who Came To Tea in 2019, why did you want to adapt Mog’s Christmas?

RF After Tiger, we looked at the whole body of Judith Kerr’s work, and the Mog books were an obvious choice for a family audience. Channel 4 agreed and we started with Mog’s Christmas, because that's the traditional slot they have for our beautiful, hand-drawn half-hour specials.

CD The Mog books are particularly appealing because so many parents and children have read them and grown up with them over the years. So many families with children have either a cat or a dog, so everyone can relate to the idea of having a beloved family pet who’s also a bit of a wally.

How are the challenges different compared to Tiger?

RF We had a lot more backgrounds this time. Tiger was full of white space and Robin (Shaw, director) uses that in Mog’s Christmas as well, just as Judith did in her illustrations for the book. In our Mog’s Christmas, there are a lot more scenes outside, including a beautiful Christmas high-street scene.

How did you attract such a brilliant voice cast?

CD It’s never as straightforward as you think, but the fact both Benedict Cumberbatch (playing Mr Thomas) and Claire Foy (playing Mrs Thomas) read the books with their kids really helped. We’d worked with Benedict on Tiger and he’d met Judith, so he was a natural choice. We were really lucky he said yes, because he was filming abroad and not taking on any other work – but he squeezed us in!

RF Adjoa Andoh was the icing on the cake as the narrator, it made the film feel warm and beautiful and luscious. She's got such a gorgeous tone to her voice which suited Mog’s thoughts perfectly.

CD They had also seen Tiger and would have known what a carefully crafted, hand-drawn film we were going to make, very true to and respectful of the spirit of the book and Judith’s illustrations.

How did you collaborate with Judith’s children, Tacy and Matthew Kneale?

RF They became the estate of Judith’s work when Judith died during the production of Tiger. When we optioned the Mog books, Tacy and Matthew wanted to be exec producers because, having grown up with their mother’s work, they wanted to oversee how we were going to adapt it. They were very hands-on with the scripting and casting approval, they've seen different stages of production all the way through and have been incredibly supportive. Because he's a writer, Matthew has really helped in terms of scripting and dialogue, and Tacy gave some fantastic feedback on character design as well as providing Mog’s miaows!

It wouldn't be a Lupus production without a song – why did you bring back David Arnold and Don Black for the music?

RF David is so good at the instrumentation. I was particularly impressed with his choice of steel pans to give a Calypso or Caribbean Christmas feel to some of the family scenes, and the brass as a nod to Salvation Army bands playing carols on the high street. Those sounds evoke a nostalgia which suits the setting perfectly.

CD I watched a lot of Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s videos during lockdown and the music for Mog’s Christmas had that slightly disco beat, so I thought she'd work. Not only is she a fantastic singer, but she's also a mum of five kids, she's great fun and a big fan of the book. And we love working with Don Black. He is an absolute master of his craft who makes us laugh with his amazing stories, because he's met everybody! He makes lyric writing look a lot easier than it actually is, because he comes up with things that are very simple but also very effective. He also comes at things from a slight tangent, which is often the best way to get the message across.

What would you like audiences to take away from Mog’s Christmas?

RF You can see the theme of belonging reflected in the different characters. Belonging isn’t just about being part of a nuclear family – the shopkeeper has his cat, Mrs Gaynor (Zawe Ashton) has her baby. You could be sitting on your own, as Mog does on top of a dustbin, and it doesn't matter if you're alone as long as you feel like you belong where you are.