“JUST A SMART LITTLE MOUSE”. THE TELEVISION REBOOT OF TOPO GIGIO FOR A CONTEMPORARY AUDIENCE. A Writers’ Round Table

Topo Gigio – The Series is the outcome of a creative overhaul that has updated and adapted the beloved puppet character created by Maria Perego in 1959 for a new generation of viewers in animated form, by placing the little mouse in a new, modern context that provides him with a (human) family and a faithful team of (animal) ‘partners in crime’. The TV series is a paradigmatic case study of a flexible, novel approach to developing and writing content for children and young audiences; one that looks at established creative practices from the US (e.g. writers’ room, comedic register, short format) without sacrificing the essence of its iconic protagonist while, at the same time, retaining its international appeal. This round table gathers the experiences of three members of the show’s writing team (Fornasari, Morosinotto, and Russo) as well as of the Project Manager (Di Domenico). After framing the key stages of the genesis of the project and exploring the challenges in the process of adaptation, they focus on key notions, approaches, pedagogic values and decisions that have informed the creation of the series content and unpack the creative process(es) with specific examples from the development documents and select scripts from individual episodes. The discussion draws from defining elements of the series world, multi-ethnic characters and thematic range to illustrate the various stages of development (e.g. pitching story ideas, outlining, treatments, teleplays), also in connection with less explored (but not least vital) territory such as team coordination and story editing.