Studio TF1 is making one in every of its most important investments in animated options in latest reminiscence, boarding “Yes Chef,” an authentic $25 million household comedy set contained in the high-pressure, fur-flying world of a televised pastry competitors.
The formidable venture, unveiled throughout the Annecy Animation Film Festival, is being produced by Studio TF1 and Matthieu Zeller’s Octopolis and nWave Pictures (“Chickenhare and the Hamster of Darkness”). The movie is predicted to be launched in 2028.
Based mostly on an authentic concept by Clara Oheyen and Matthieu Zeller, “Yes Chef” is written by Lauren Hynek and Elizabeth Martin, whose credit embrace Disney’s live-action “Mulan” and Skydance Animation’s “Spellbound.” Annie Carrel and Benjamin Mousquet, who beforehand labored on “Chickenhare and the Hamster of Darkness” and its sequel, “Chickenhare and the Secret of the Groundhog,” are directing.
The venture marks a notable step for Studio TF1 because it builds up its movie distribution operation in France whereas additionally leaning on the experience of its animation studio Blue Spirit and its worldwide gross sales group, led by Rodolphe Buet and Alice Damiani. As such, Studio TF1 will roll out the movie theatrically in native cinemas, on high pf dealing with worldwide gross sales, making “Yes Chef” a full-scale play throughout improvement, manufacturing, French distribution and world gross sales.
“It’s a project on which Studio TF1 has fully partnered with Matthieu Zeller from the very beginning and we’ve been working hand in hand,” Nathalie Toulza Madar, the managing director of Studio TF1, instructed Selection in an interview alongside Zeller throughout the Annecy pageant.
Toulza Madar additionally confirmed “there isn’t another recent animated project like ‘Yes Chef,’ where the studio is investing so fully alongside an outside partner.” “That’s what makes this association quite strong,” she added, noting that Studio TF1 and Zeller additionally simply collaborated on “Les Gendarmes,” a comicbook-based movie.
The animation on “Yes Chef” is being dealt with by nWave Studios, Octopolis and Blue Spirit, whereas UMedia is on board as tax shelter associate.
The transfer comes at a time when French animation continues to punch above its weight internationally, pushed by a deep expertise pool of artists, administrators, writers and technicians, even because the sector faces new pressures from AI and shifting manufacturing fashions. Some of the seen latest examples is “Minions & Monsters,” the newest installment in Illumination’s billion-dollar “Despicable Me” franchise, which was co-written and directed by French animator, Pierre Coffin. Zeller, a former high-ranking govt at Studiocanal, additionally has a observe report in delivering fairly budgeted indie European animation motion pictures that work nicely in theaters. The “Chickenhare” sequel which he produced drew 858,000 admissions in France final 12 months.
“Yes Chef” — “Oui Chef” in French — unfolds in an anthropomorphic animal world round a long-running TV pastry contest hosted by charismatic chef André Lamour. The competitors, which has been on the air for 20 years, brings collectively duos of contestants, together with a grandmother sheep and her teenage lamb grandson, deer cousins, twin cat sisters and different animal bakers.
Behind the scenes is Jeanne Gazelle, a frazzled producer panicking over declining rankings. With the assistance of a military of small rabbits working cameras, lights and the complete studio equipment, she pushes the present towards more and more spectacular challenges — till the stunts change into so outrageous that they barely have something to do with baking anymore. Because the competitors spins uncontrolled, the contestants insurgent with a cry of “No Chef,” taking again the present and returning it to what Zeller describes as the center of baking: working collectively, sharing one thing, and taking pleasure in making and consuming a very good cake.
“It’s a real comedy in that world,” Zeller mentioned. “The trials pile up with all the comedy and spectacle you can imagine — flour, eggs, falling meringues, fur exploding everywhere.”
Zeller mentioned the concept grew out of a number of converging developments, from the enduring reputation of baking exhibits to the explosion of baking movies on TikTok and the broader household enchantment of meals as leisure.
“We built our conviction around the fact that this is a universe where we are legitimate as French and European creators,” Zeller mentioned. “It’s also something that is quite new, and it carries meaning — around family bonds, sharing and being together.”
He added that baking and cooking are “very much a family thing,” which made the venture match naturally with the type of broad-audience animated options nWave has been making, “to bring children, parents and grandparents together in a movie theater,” Zeller mentioned.
The movie can also be designed as a brand new authentic IP, fairly than an extension of an current franchise — some extent that each Zeller and Toulza Madar emphasised.
“It’s clearly a new brand, but one that very clearly has IP potential,” Toulza Madar mentioned. “For now, we are starting with the feature film, which is already a big endeavor, knowing that it has the potential to be developed in different formats.”
Zeller mentioned the theatrical launch is central to that technique. “We have the conviction that building IP begins with the feature film. There are other ways to build IP, but our belief is that it is through the theatrical release, through the theatrical event, that you build its life,” he argued.
At $25 million, “Yes Chef” sits in the identical funds vary as nWave’s latest options: modest in contrast with main U.S. studio animation, however formidable by European requirements. Zeller mentioned the movie will use the 3D animation methods nWave has lengthy practiced, whereas persevering with to evolve the studio’s visible language. The venture will even mark a technical shift: it will likely be the primary nWave movie made solely with a Maya-Houdini pipeline, developed in coordination with Blue Spirit.
Studio TF1 was at Cannes this 12 months with a number of titles, together with László Nemes’ World Struggle II drama “Moulin,” which performed in competitors and stars Gilles Lellouche as French Resistance hero Jean Moulin.
