A decision to sue the makers of Spitting Image over a depiction of Paddington Bear as a foul-mouthed drug addict is an attack on comedy and freedom of expression, the comedians behind the reinvention have said.
StudioCanal, the production company that made the recent Paddington movies, is taking legal action against the team behind Spitting Image over the character’s reimagining as the co-host of a satirical podcast, The Rest is Bulls*!t.
In a new YouTube video responding to the lawsuit, however, a dishevelled Paddington is again seen snorting cocaine and using StudioCanal’s legal letter as toilet paper. The video calls on viewers to “remember to like and subscribe before Paddington gets cancelled”.
The online show featuring Paddington’s makeover is produced by Avalon, the makers of Spitting Image – the satirical TV puppet show that angered numerous politicians when it ran throughout the 1980s.
The latest programme, a poke at the successful stable of podcasts produced by Gary Lineker’s company, Goalhanger, runs on YouTube and features Paddington and Prince Harry as hosts.
The two comedians who created the show, Al Murray and Matt Forde, said they were amazed when the high court lawsuit reached them.
“We’re baffled by that, to be honest,” Murray said in a Radio Times interview alongside Forde. “If we were going to expect anything, it would be a hard stare from Paddington.
“There obviously has been a drift towards people who want to shut other people’s jokes up, and it’s weird, it seems like an attack on comedy, really.”
Forde said it was part of a wider pressure on freedom of expression, pointing to the recent suspension of the US comedian Jimmy Kimmel after he criticised the Trump administration’s response to the killing of the rightwing political activist Charlie Kirk.
“It’s terrifying that pressure can come from all sorts of different places,” Forde said. “I think the risk is that these kinds of authoritarian instincts exist on left and right.
“People need to be careful about thinking: ‘Well, I never liked Jimmy Kimmel anyway, so I’m fine with it’, because eventually they will get round to you, and they will shut you up.
“Comedy is an easy first target because people don’t like being laughed at, but it’s not comedy that they have an issue with. It’s the freedom of speech.”
The high court complaint against the depiction of Paddington cites copyright and design rights concerns. StudioCanal declined to comment.
