Gently does it
BBC series Small Prophets is Mackenzie Crook’s spiritual successor to the acclaimed Detectorists. He joins producer Gill Isles to outline the “gentle” new comedy, his decision to move behind the camera and creating the show’s animated stars.
Deep in the post-production process, Mackenzie Crook is watching his new series come to life – with the help of some animated magical sprites.
Crook is best known on screen as Gareth Keenan from The Office, or for his various turns as Ragetti in the blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. But over the past decade, he has established himself as a writer and director thanks to original series such as Detectorists and a reimagining of children’s fantasy show Worzel Gummidge.
It’s a dual role the star now reprises on his latest project, Small Prophets, a six-part comedy commissioned by the BBC that reunites Crook with his Detectorists co-star Pearce Quigley.
Quigley plays eccentric Michael Sleep who, since his darling Clea disappeared seven years earlier, has lived a very ordinary life. He eats Shreddies, works in a DIY store, visits dad Brian (Michael Palin) and hopes for Clea to return.
Then one day, Brian shares an old recipe involving rainwater, horse manure and more than a little alchemy. With recipe in hand, Michael sets out (albeit with some scepticism) to create Homunculi – magical beings that can predict the future – in the hope they have the answer to his burning question, ‘Will I ever see Clea again?’ Michael gets help from his unlikely friendship with young workmate Kacey (Lauren Patel), though their pairing only adds to the intrigue of his nosy neighbours (Sophie Willan and Jon Pointing), who are obsessed with trying to find out what the hell is going on in Michael’s garden shed.
When DQ speaks to Crook – sitting in his own garden shed that doubles as his office – and producer Gill Isles, they are about halfway through editing on the series, which is produced by Treasure Trove Productions and Blue House Productions. Sphere Abacus is the international distributor. “To be honest, I couldn’t be happier,” he says. “I’m really excited about it and really excited about people seeing it. It’s a strange one, but I think it’s really funny.”
As a comedy, Crook describes Small Prophets as a spiritual successor to the BAFTA-winning Detectorists, his beloved series about two friends and members of the Danebury Metal Detecting Club. “It’s the same sort of tone as Detectorists in that it’s not a roller-coaster ride of hilarity, but it’s gentle and it’s charming, and it’s got this supernatural element,” he explains. “It’s about this lonely man played by Pearce. His partner went missing nearly seven years ago. He didn’t know where she went. But then he comes upon this recipe to grow these magical prophesying spirits in jars in his shed, and they can answer any questions. So that’s what he does. It’s set in this very ordinary suburban world, but there are magical things going on down in the shed.”
Standing behind him in his office are prototypes of three Homunculi, created from the star’s own sketches by stop-motion animation studio Mackinnon & Saunders. His friends Ainslie Henderson and Will Anderson then took over the animation process and are recording approximately eight seconds of footage a day at their studio in Northumberland.
“It’s all stop-motion, so it’s very painstaking,” Crook says of the animation technique also used to bring Nick Park’s Wallace & Gromit to life. It’s also his first time working with animation. “As we’re editing, we’re getting these bits of animation which you’re able to slot in, and it’s looking incredible.”
“We’re editing remotely, so I’m at home, as is Mackenzie, as is the editor,” says Isles, who also previously worked with Crook on Detectorists. “The exciting bits are when the animation plops into our Dropbox. It’s a new aspect of production that I’ve never been involved in but it’s completely fascinating. Seeing everything come to life adds a real extra dimension to the show.”
In the series, the spirits only appear in Michael’s shed. When it came to filming in Manchester, the shed was built in a studio where the environment could be controlled more easily than a real shed. All the shed scenes were then completed first, giving the animation artists as much time as possible to insert the Homunculi into the shot footage.
“We were working very closely together [with Henderson and Anderson] in that first week, getting all the shots they knew they’d need, and more,” Crook says. “It was quite a painstaking thing.”
“Beginning with the animated element was a really good way to start because it’s such an integral part of the whole show. Having Pearce and Lauren acting with the cast of smaller characters was really good,” Isles continues. “We had the paint tests [models] on set so Pearce and Lauren knew what they were acting against. But we made sure we put plenty of time aside, because that was a whole new world to us. But it was a good way of everybody getting to know each other and working with Will and Ainslie so they were part of the process, right from the beginning.”
The idea behind Small Prophets dates back more than a decade, to when Crook found a story in a 19th century book about alchemy called The Life of Paracelsus, which included a recipe for growing Homunculi.
“It fascinated me, but I didn’t know how to use it, this germ of an idea,” he says. More recently, the series started to take shape with Quigley in the lead role, as Crook was keen to work with the actor again after their partnership on Detectorists. In that show, Quigley played club member Russell alongside Crook’s Andy and Toby Jones as Lance.
“I suppose I first wrote scripts about three years ago. It did take a while to get up and running,” Crook says. “It’s more expensive, perhaps because of the animation side of things, so we had to find some investment.” But after the success of Detectorists and Worzel Gummidge on the BBC, Crook had the broadcaster’s backing to run with his ideas.
“I realise I’m in a very fortunate position there. Detectorists on paper didn’t sound like it would set the world alight, so I’ve got this really nice, trusting relationship with the BBC. I suppose it was just 10 years in percolating and figuring out what exactly this was.”
Around the same time he began plotting Small Prophets, Crook also took a turn in his own career as he started to spend more time behind the camera than in front of it. After writing and directing episodes of Sky historical drama Britannia, Detectorists arrived in 2014 and ran for three seasons and a pair of Christmas specials. He wrote and directed every episode, before doing the same on Worzel Gummidge, and has since directed all six episodes of the second season of Bridget Christie’s Channel 4 comedy The Change.
“And I love it. I love the writing process. I love the editing,” he says. “The actual filming, I get very anxious about. There are so many moving parts, so many people, so many things that could go wrong. Once that’s done, then I can relax into this stage, which is probably my favourite part, putting the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle together, honing it, tightening it and making it as good as it can be.
“I play a small part in Small Prophets, Michael’s boss at the DIY store, and I was in quite a bad mood when I was doing those bits. I enjoy directing and writing now probably more than I do the acting. Although I have to say, I’m quite pleased with my character. He has turned out to be quite amusing.”
He writes all the scripts in his garden shed, and likes to have each one “properly finished and honed” even before he starts pre-production. “There is a little bit of fiddling to do when we’re in pre-production, but the writing is all done, and then I can swap roles into being a director. That’s the way I like to do it,” he says.
Though Small Prophets might share a similar style and comedic tone with Detectorists, the look of the show is quite different, with Crook noting that the series marks the first time he’s made a show not in a rural setting. “I work very closely and lean quite heavily on my DOP,” he says. “Nick Brown shot the last special of Detectorists and he’s got a brilliant eye. He sets up the shots for me. I do have an idea of what I want, but it’s not a rigid thing. I find that I can trust him to find the beautiful visuals.”
Isles was in the edit for Detectorists when Crook first broached the idea of Small Prophets around five years ago, when he had only written a page treatment and a small amount of script.
“That’s when it all started coming together,” Crook says. “Five years previous to that, it was just percolating, wondering what it was. Pearce Quigley had a role in Detectorists, and maybe earlier on I thought it was a spin-off following Russell. But then we quickly realised that, no, it was something separate. But I wanted Pearce to be the lead in it. He’s a funny man. He’s under-appreciated. He plays lots of smaller roles and sidekick characters, but I wanted to see him front and centre in this one.”
Appearing in about 90% of Small Prophets’ scenes, Quigley took the responsibility of leading the show incredibly seriously. “From the beginning of the year, he approached this like an athlete,” Crook says. “He gave up drinking, gave up smoking and started exercising just because he wanted to be ready and fit and healthy. He’s absolutely mesmerising and hilarious. I can’t wait for people to see it.”
“He’s incredible in this, just mesmerising as an actor,” Isles says of Quigley, with whom she also worked on Peter Kay comedy Car Share. “He’s brilliant, such a leading man. It’s just a no-brainer that he should be Michael.”
It was the animation side of making Small Prophets that particularly appealed to the producer, whose other credits include Alma’s Not Normal and Man Like Mobeen. “Working with Mackenzie is just an absolute joy, so I feel quite privileged to even be a part of it. Even reading the first script, it’s all there,” she says. “The best thing about working with Mackenzie is that the ideas are unlike anything else. It’s never really challenging to bring that to life. It’s just always a really big collaboration, which from a producer point of view is the perfect thing.”
Blending magic and fantasy in a comedy might have made Small Prophets a bit of a risky proposition, particularly at a time in the television industry when money is tight and broadcasters are steering away from bigger bets in favour of sure-fire hits often based on existing properties.
Detectorists might have been considered the same, “but it was low stakes. It was not greatly expensive. It was hidden away on BBC Four, so they were happy to just trust me and let me do what I wanted,” Crook says. “That really helped with this. They’re happy to trust me, let me make it what I think it should be. It’s a bit more high stakes. It’s a bit more expensive. But in general, there are algorithms that people are paying too much attention to, and people don’t want to take risks. I’m grateful they have taken a risk on this one.”
More than 10 years after its debut, Detectorists is still finding new audiences on BBC iPlayer in the UK, while it also has built a substantial following overseas. “People have taken it to their hearts. I get people having really quite emotional reactions to it,” Crook says. “A lot of people found it during Covid, and it was a real comfort. A lot of the time, people say that to me – that it’s been such a comfort. It was always the idea to do something uncynical, and this show has got that same lack of cynicism in it as well. You’re going to love the characters. It’s got a warmth to it. Hopefully it’ll appeal to the same audience as Detectorists and a broader audience as well.”
Detectorists and Small Prophets also speak to Crook’s tastes as a filmmaker, having made his name in Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s mockumentary The Office before starring beneath extensive make-up in both Pirates of the Caribbean and Britannia. He also had a six-episode run in Game of Thrones. Growing up, he “absolutely adored” sitcoms such as The Good Life and Ever Decreasing Circles, which were equally comforting and uncynical.
“People talked about Detectorists being ‘gentle comedy,’ which I didn’t like at first, but I’ve made my peace with that. For me, ‘gentle’ sounded like ‘unfunny.’ But there’s something whimsical about it. The cruel comedy, that awkwardness that was in The Office, I am a fan of that. I can cope with that. But perhaps that’s not my style, and I’m more comfortable doing this, whatever this genre is.”
The music in Small Prophets will further accentuate that tone. Crook linked up with Californian composer Amelia Baker, a multi-instrumentalist and songwriter who performs under the name Cinder Well, to create the soundtrack for the series. A fan of hers for a number of years, he reached out to her about the project and describes their partnership as “a dream come true.” In particular, he hopes the folk artist’s contribution will elevate the poignant moments and storylines in Small Prophets. “Michael has been lost since his partner went missing, so there’s all that poignancy and heartache in it,” he says. “Amelia’s music will bring that out. But I shouldn’t keep going on about how sad it is. First and foremost, it’s a comedy.”
With the final episode of Small Prophets concluding with ‘To be continued,’ Crook has set the series up for a return after its debut in early 2026 on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer, teasing that “there’s still a quest to go on.” He adds: “I would love at least another series, if not two. The three-series model works for me. I’ve already mapped out where a second series could go and ideas even about a third one.”
Until then, he hopes the stop-motion animation in Small Prophets brings an element of surprise to the show, at a time when audiences have become used to watching CGI on screen. “CGI is so ubiquitous these days that you don’t even notice it. You’re not surprised by it,” he says. “But with the very specific way these creatures move, that Ray Harryhausen look, I think people are going to be mesmerised by them.”
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tagged in: BBC, Detectorists, Gill Isles, Mackenzie Crook, Pearce Quigley, Small Prophets