Embalmer Frank Finnegan must take drastic measures to get his dead clients to their graves, but not before they’ve had a cup of tea.
Wiggleywoo recently started production on its first animated feature film, Tea with the Dead. The feature is a spin off of our award winning short of the same name released in 2014. The short was broadcast on TG4 and won BEST ANIMATION at Raindance and Rhode Island and was selected for screening in dozens of film festivals around the world.
This project has been a Labour of love of Director/Writer/Designer Gilly and Producer Susan Broe.
Tea with the Dead is quintessentially Irish, its characters, its storytelling, its location, its language but ultimately it has a universal theme, grief and love. The short hit a chord with our audiences all over the world, people cried, people laughed and people loved it. The deceased characters Frank speaks to, all have sad stories that made our audience cry but they all had an uplifting joyous ending which left the audience charmed by the films finale. The feature will have all these characteristics too and ultimately will be a charming story that takes the viewer through the five stages of grief with the films main character Frank Finnegan punctuated with the deceased characters storytelling.
Colm Meaney plays the main character Frank Finnegan. Frank is no ordinary embalmer, after he has disinfected, embalmed, washed and dressed the dead he does two more things, he makes them a cup of tea and then brings them back to life. They talk and laugh over tea and biscuits before he puts them into their coffin and sends them on their way.
Tea with the Dead will be released in the autumn of 2023 and will be broadcast on RTE television.
