Teletubbies creator Anne Wood

The real story

Wood grew up in a colliery village near County Durham during the Second World War. Despite not having much access to literature as a child, she self-published her own magazine, Books For Children, and founded the Federation Of Children's Books Groups, which caught the attention of TV producers.

A stint at Yorkshire Television and TV-AM saw her create her first show Rub-A-Dub-Tub before a change of management saw her set up her own production company, where she created the likes of Rosie And Jim.

Teletubbies came about when, during a trip stateside to try to break America, Wood and Tots TV puppeteer Andrew Davenport visited Washington's National Air And Space Museum and noticed that astronauts walking on the moon resembled giant babies. The idea was cemented when Wood's mother, who suffered from MS and was in a wheelchair, commented that there were so many domestic devices beeping while Wood had popped out to the shops and so realised, Thats the atmosphere that little kids are growing up in. The Teletubbies became "technological babies, living in a technological environment.

Since then, Wood has worked on other hit shows In The Night Garden and Twirlywoos, and is still developing ideas today at the age of 82.

The Hollywood pitch

The year is 1996 and technology is everywhere: picture commuters rushing around listening to Walkmans, the BBC launching one of its first websites to document the Olympic Games and school children playing with Tamagotchis under their desks. Meanwhile, after 20 years working in childrens TV, Anne Wood is juggling looking after her ill mother with managing her own production company and fighting the influx of American shows on British childrens TV. Space travel, tech and transatlantic media collide as Wood adapts to a changing world, but will it be enough to save the UK's children's programming from an American takeover?

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Time for Tubby bye-bye? She's only just getting started

Who would play Anne Wood?

"It would have to be someone with a bit of acerbic-ness about them. Meryl Streep, lets say," says Wood.

The real story

Over the course of his career, Keith Chapman has dreamed up two of the biggest children's TV shows of all time, Bob The Builder and Paw Patrol, the former making 5 billion since it was created and the latter doubling that figure in the past six years alone.

Describing his life as one big cartoon, Chapman was always drawing as a child and his first cartoons got published in a local newspaper when he was just 12 years old. He went on to study graphic illustration at art college, after which he went to work in advertising, before moving to work for the Muppets' creator, Jim Henson.

Every night, he'd go home and work on his own ideas, testing them out on his three young boys. The character they'd always want to hear more of was, of course, Bob, who Chapman dreamed up after he saw a JCB outside his flat in Wimbledon Village. He pitched the idea to HIT Entertainment, who optioned the show and turned it into the stop-frame classic we're all now familiar with. From beating Westlife to a Christmas No1 with Can We Fix It?" to shows at the O2, the success of Bob The Builder was unprecedented and gave Chapman the opportunity to start his own company, Chapman Entertainment, which created shows such as Rory The Racing Car and Fifi And The Flowertots.

Unfortunately, the company was one of many to be hit by the Great Recession and eventually had to close down, with the bank selling the rights to their properties to Dreamworks. Paw Patrol came about a few years later when Chapman was approached by toy company Spin Master to create a show based on emergency vehicles and since then it's become a worldwide success. The work doesn't stop there, though. Currently Chapman has about 15 projects in the works, ranging from adult cartoons to feature-length films.

The Hollywood pitch

Christmas No1s, sold-out shows at the O2, billions of pounds' worth of merchandise sales: Keith Chapman is at the top of his game, riding high on the success of his hit show Bob The Builder and his growing production company. But nothing lasts for ever. Can he pick up the pieces after he's hit by hard times during the recession? A tale of resilience and creativity, there's only one thing that save him: his imagination.

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Life is one big cartoon. How you draw it is up to you.

Who would play Keith Chapman?

Sometimes people say that look like Alec Baldwin," says Chapman. "I cant see it myself, but a few people have so maybe him. Of course, he wouldnt get the accent, so it would have to be a British actor: Gary Oldman, hes a brilliant actor. Hes got London roots so hell probably get the accent.

Born in Leeds but raised in Liverpool, Brenton's childhood was spent playing outside and watching shows such as Danger Mouse, Grange Hill, Crackerjack and Play Away. Like Chapman, he also went to art college, but followed that up with a stint at drama college, where he and a friend set up a theatre company to pay the bills, often staging shows for children.

Eventually, Brenton landed a gig presenting on Playbus, where he copresented with Iain Lauchlan, who would later become his business partner. This is also where he learnt to write and direct and the pair began to write and perform in pantomimes in Coventry.

Their Bafta-winning show Tweenies was born when the duo got wind that the BBC had invited companies to pitch ideas for a follow-up from Teletubbies for a slightly older audience. While waiting in the wings at a production of Cinderella, ready to take the stage as an ugly step sister, he took his chance and asked the then director of BBC Children's, Roy Thompson, if he and Lauchlan could pitch an idea. The pair had already been creating a series of videos called Fun Song Factory, so this was the natural next step. Thompson sent them a brief and the pair got to work creating ideas until they won the slot. It was the Tweenies' first live tour that made the success of the show really sink in for Brenton. That year we sold more tickets than Robbie Williams and Britney Spears put together. It was huge.

The Hollywood pitch

Life as an aspiring young actor can be tough, but if you come at the industry from all directions, it might just let you in. Will Brenton becomes a multi-hyphenate long before millennials made it the norm, in a story that shows that determination and ingenuity can go a long way. Going from Coventry pantomimes to tours that sold more tickets than Robbie Williams and Britney Spears combined, Brenton's journey is far from conventional, but aren't those always the best kind of rides?

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Are you ready to play?

Who would play Will Brenton?

I asked my wife this and she said David Thewlis," says Brenton. "When I was still acting I was offered a part in a Yorkshire TV series called A Bit Of A Do, but I couldnt do it because I was doing a theatre show. The actor who ended up doing it was David Thewlis. It was his first TV part and it kicked everything off for him. He played it better than I would have done, but we were laughing about that, saying how it would be ironic if he would then one day play me in a movie.

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The British children's show creators worthy of the biopic treatment - British GQ