Moon and Me is a classic series of gentle and emotive tales about a magical toy, Pepi Nana, who lives in a Toy House with a “family” of comical toy friends. Together they welcome a special visitor from the Moon, Moon Baby, who opens a magical way into Storyland, where they share the wonderful stories waiting for them.

Moon and Me - Time To Go To Sleep - BBC Moon and Me - Time To Go To Sleep - BBC

Davenport already has plans for fifty more Moon and Me episodes although his shows appear about as regularly as new Kate Bush albums. “I’d love to make the next one in less than ten years time,” he admitted. “This is just the time it takes to develop a show like this. Moon and Me just felt like the right thing to do next.” Davenport, 53, who has a BSc in speech sciences, conducted his own academic research before embarking on the project. “I was interested in the literary storm of ‘toy house’ stories in the middle of the nineteenth century which are still in print today,” Davenport told i. Commissioned by BBC Children’s and airing on CBeebies from 4 February 2019, Moon and Me is produced by Andrew Davenport’s Foundling Bird, in association with Sutikki, the kids and family division of Bento Box Entertainment. The Commissioning Editor for CBeebies is Michael Towner.Davenport emerged with “a show that wears its emotional heart on its sleeve. Pepi Nana and her friends share books, write letters to each other, draw pictures, make things, invent things and go in search of adventure together.” ‘Tiddle-toddle’ Each Davenport series has its own distinct visual style. “With Teletubbies we had to build a believable scale world from a child’s point of view around adult actors in suits.” The show breaks new ground in its technical, visual and conceptual ambition and combines the latest production methods, using a combination of sophisticated puppetry and stop-motion to bring the colourful Moon and Me world to life. The Toy House alone features over 500 incredibly detailed, individually designed, hand-built and hand-painted miniature props and furnishings, with hidden messages for children to discover in many of the patterns and decorations. Moon and Me, launching as part of the newly re-vamped CBeebies Bedtime from 4 February, is a 50x22’ magical new series for pre-school, created, written, composed and produced by Andrew Davenport (Teletubbies, In the Night Garden) and told by Nina Sosanya (Good Omens, W1A, Last Tango in Halifax, Killing Eve, Love Actually). The series “taps into children’s innate curiosity and desire to create through their play routines, forming their own imaginary worlds and relationships through their toys.”

BBC iPlayer - Moon and Me - Series 1: 1. Pepi Nana’s Letter

Michael Towner, Commissioning Editor at CBeebies, said it was “vital” for children to experience quality UK-originated pre-school programming. One read of the original pitch was all it took to convince us that Andrew had, once again, come up with an idea so beautifully simple yet rich and ambitious in scope that we couldn’t not have it,” he said. A Hollywood entertainment company, Bento Box Entertainment, partnered with Davenport’s Foundling Bird business to bring to produce Moon and Me, which is designed to relax toddlers and prepare them for sleepy-time. Magical Toy HouseInspired by well-loved tales of toys that come to life when nobody is looking, every enchanting episode of Moon and Me begins with a child gently putting a selection of favourite toys - Pepi Nana, Colly Wobble, Little Nana, Lambkin, Mr. Onion, Sleepy Dibillo and Lily Plant - to bed in their Toy House. But Pepi Nana is a very special toy - at night when the Moon shines, she comes to life, then sits down at her desk to write a letter to the Moon. Moon Baby, who lives there, receives the letter and visits the Toy House for tea. By playing magical music on his kalimba, he wakes up the other toy friends so they can all join in a new story together. Pepi Nana says “tiddle toddle” because those kinds of sounds are how children learn to play with language, says Davenport, who has no children of his own but plenty of godchildren. Moon Baby, Lambkin, Mr Onion, Sleepy Dibillo, Colly Wobble, Pepi Nana, Little Nana (BBC) Andrew Davenport is renowned for creating premium quality television for young children, built on a special regard for play. Moon and Me’s narrative and structure has, in part, developed out of Foundling Bird’s own Toy House Play Observation Project, conducted in partnership with the University of Sheffield, which looked at the way children engage with toy houses in contemporary play.