Whirlpools, home-made fudge and viral music videos: the making of Swashbuckle Series 3

Your little one's favourite pirate-themed show returns to CBeebies on Saturday 4th July at 11:00am (and again at 5:00pm). We sat down with the show's producer, Jon Hancock, to find out what to expect from the third series of Swashbuckle...

So Jon, what can we expect from the new series of Swashbuckle? 

The third series of Swashbuckle sees a brand new game called Wacky Whirlpool. Imagine a small child at a ten-pin bowling alley and an enormous circular rotating platform and you’re getting somewhere close to what it is!! Our Production Designer, Alison, is a fabulous games-maker and we had lots of fun with this one. She also loved the episode storyline where there’s been a high-tide and the entire shipwreck is covered in seaweed!

The sketches have had a new Script Editor on board too - James Cary (who was a co-writer on Miranda, created Bluestone 42 and has also script edited Mr Bloom’s Nursery and Gigglebiz) was on hand to ensure Cook, Line and Sinker are as funny as ever!

How do you go about coming up with new game ideas?

We take inspiration from equipment that children are already familiar with at parks, playgrounds or soft-play centres. So Wacky Whirlpool includes elements of a park roundabout and the ramps that children use at ten-pin bowling alleys. Once we had the idea it was then a case of adding a pirate theme so it fits in with the show.

We then we test the basic concept of the game (in a very low-tech way!) before we commit to building the large-scale props. Then it’s a matter of bringing it all to the studio, and playing it over and over again until we’re happy to set the rules all our Swashbucklers will play to. It’s enormous fun – but I can’t believe we came up with 8 games for the first series!

Tell us a bit about Message in a Bottle…

Message in a Bottle is a little idea we had whilst filming the 2nd series of Swashbuckle. We thought it would be a lovely idea to use the story themes from previous episodes to inspire some large-scale artwork… so these short programmes see children sending Gem a message in bottle asking her to look at a piece of art they’ve created. We had some fabulous schools involved and there are some really impressive creations – which I hope will inspire some piratical art activity at home!

You're on the third series of Swashbuckle now so all the cast and crew must know each other pretty well by now; what’s the atmosphere like and have you guys got any on set traditions by now?

It is like a family on Swashbuckle and we all get on very well. It’s become an extended family actually as two of our three make-up artists have given birth over the last couple of years (and the third was pregnant when we filmed this year!) 

It’s a tough 3 weeks in the studio, filming 2 episodes a day, but we have a giggle as is evident by some of the silly films we make! Last year we couldn’t believe how popular our Happy music video was so this year we’ve made another one, inspired by our new game for this series!!

When in the studio, Gem insists that we have ‘Pirate Friday’ where everyone on team has to come to work dressed as a pirate. Some people really go to town and the winners receive some of Gem’s delicious homemade fudge! Those who don’t make such an effort have to wear the ‘Parrot Costume of Shame’!! There is a LOT of laughter on set!

Were you into pirates when you were little and what do you think makes a pirate-themed series so much fun for little ones?

I don’t remember being into pirates when I was young, but I have 4 children of my own so, to be honest, I can’t remember anything much before last Tuesday. 

Playing pirates involves dressing up (I have a certain 4 year old friend who has worn his pirate captain outfit every day for over a year!), and it’s physical fun and full of pantomime slapstick comedy. It also encourages role-play – who doesn’t like a good growl and ahaarrr at people twice your height?!

The thing that always amuses me about young children and what perfect pirates they make is that they rarely have a full set of teeth!

What goes into planning a big series like Swashbuckle?

It’s an enormous job. The most important thing is to find our brilliant contestants. Finding and licensing over 100 children is a huge task and our researchers did a brilliant job. We go to schools, play games with them and, with the teachers help, select a team of Swashbucklers. The rest of the year group them come to be the audience during filming so there’s a lovely sense of encouragement and camaraderie in the studio. 

Then it’s just (ha!) a case of getting the brilliant studio team together to work really efficiently to film 2 episodes a day. It’s an exhausting period, but we work as a very well-oiled machine now and anyone who comes to visit the studio says what a lovely bunch we are! It’s a strange feeling when we finish filming because the team goes from around 50 to about 4 people as we then begin to edit the series together. As I sit and write this blog, I currently have all 26 episodes at various stages of completion and I’m watching at least 5 episodes of Swashbuckle a day as we polish them ready for broadcast! I’ll be honest – I’m a little bit tired of the Swashbuckle Salute now! But however many times I see them, there are still many Shipwreck Rummages that have me on the edge of my seat, so if it can get MY heart racing then hopefully your little ones will enjoy this series as much as they have the others.

Swashbuckle returns on Saturday 4th July at 11:00am again at 5:00pm.

Find out more about the series here.