Britt Allcroft, a British author, producer, and director, handed away. She was 81.
She was accountable for bringing Thomas the Tank Engine, an animated locomotive, to tv and beginning a well-liked and profitable franchise.
Holly Wright, Allcroft’s daughter, knowledgeable The New York Times that her mom handed away in Los Angeles on Christmas Day.
The Rev. Wilbert Awdry drew inspiration for Thomas the Tank Engine from a wood toy he manufactured for his son and used it in a collection of youngsters’s books printed within the Nineteen Forties.
Allcroft’s preliminary adaption, which she funded by taking out a mortgage on her residence, was a 26-episode tv collection that debuted as Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends on ITV within the United Kingdom in 1984.
Ringo Starr was chosen by Allcroft to play Mr. Conductor, the primary narrator of the soothing program. The Beatles drummer could be adopted by George Carlin, Alec Baldwin, and Pierce Brosnan.
Allcroft and American producer Rick Siggelkow created the spinoff Shining Time Station, which debuted on PBS within the United States in 1989. She additionally produced Mr. Conductor’s Thomas Tales, one other spinoff, in 1996.
Allcroft additionally created the animated collection Magic Adventures of Mumfie, which was based mostly on Katharine Tozer’s books and included an elephant.
Hilary Mary Allcroft was born in West Sussex, England, on December 14, 1943, and on the age of 19, she was employed by the BBC.
After that, she labored for Southern Television earlier than beginning her personal manufacturing agency to begin stage and tv productions.
