Hair Bear Bunch...

Also at long bleeding last, I finally got around to fitting hair to Boris. I decided to punch it - Jaysus...

Anyway, here it is...

And here he is before his trim...

Fuck me, it's Katie Hopkins!

Chips, meet Piss...

Things have been quiet in Rubber Balls Towers of late. We had planned a Christmas Sketch but my dear old dad died shortly before Christmas, which rather took the wind out of my sails. Quite frankly, I lost my mojo and felt no enthusiasm for doing anything much.

Also, doubts about the very basis of Rubber Balls had been setting in anyway, as I don't feel that people are really that interested in satirical sketch type humour - there are now so many outlets, such as topical comedy panel shows on TV, radio shows, and a torrent of stuff on the internet. I mean, how can one compete with, say, a snappy Photoshopped gag on Twitter or Facebook?

And then, just as I started getting back to work on another (related) project, ITV announced Newzoids, a new '...puppet show [which] promises a “biting look at the world of politics and celebrity”, nearly 20 years after the end of Spitting Image.' Thank you very fucking much, ITV, for pissing all over Rubber Balls's chips. That said, I do really hope that Newzoids is a massive hit as, with luck, that will stimulate interest in all things puppety...

Meanwhile, to feel like I'm getting somewhere, I've just finished painting the Benjamin Netanyahu puppet head - whether it gets used or not is another thing...

Dad would have loved it - he hated Netanyahu...

Nigel's Calypso!

For the first time ever, we went out on location with a puppet! And broke out into song! We spent an enjoyable afternoon freaking shoppers out, and making small children piss themselves laughing, on Walthamstow High Street as we filmed Nigel's Calypso!



Here we penetrate the veil concealing the magic of Rubber Balls...

Rogues' gallery...

You don't want to be in my workshop at night...

And you can see most of the buggers here:

Meet the cast!

Yesterday was spent shooting new Rubber Balls sketches with our new cast! Here are some action-packed shots to whet your appetite...

Call me Dave...

Next up is David Cameron. Even though he has a fairly distinctive face, all smooth and sleekly chubby as all well-fed aristocrats should be - Caitlin Moran once said in an immortal line, "Cameron looks like C3P0 made of ham" - nevertheless, when it actually came to sculpting him, I found it immensely difficult, despite having made a small-scale maquette first. The final sculpt ended up departing somewhat from the maquette - what works small often doesn't work life-size...

By the weekend, Boris and Dave should be complete in puppet form as we prepare to shoot new Rubber Balls videos, so watch this space!

Who's the slaphead, who's the slaphead...?

It's Baldy Boris! In a departure from my usual technique of sculpting the hair as part of the final rubber casting, in the case of Boris Johnson that simply wouldn't do - his famously unruly hair simply cannot be sculpted. And so he's been modelled bald and will have a shaggy blonde wig fitted! Also, in another departure (behind the scenes this time), I'm using Alec Tiranti's Basic Alpha Plaster to make the mould. It is much harder, though more expensive, than the Prestia Classic I have hitherto used, and this increased robustness has already been noticeable as I dug the clay out of the mould with wooden tools and at no point scratched the surface of the mould, whereas with Prestia Classic even a wooden tool can mark and gouge.