Series Two of Kate Jessop’s bitingly satirical, queer, animated comedy sketch series, Tales From Pussy Willow, returns to even greater praise.
Animation director (and previous Cinema Jammer of the month) Kate Jessop released the second series of her acclaimed comedy web series Tales From Pussy Willow this October and, we liked it so much, we featured a segment in the programme for that month’s Jam Session where our community of directors, producers, cinematographers, writers and other film professionals loved it just as much as we did.
We spoke to Kate about the series when the first episodes debuted last year (you can read our chat about it here) and you can view each episode on YouTube on the series’ page.
The series itself revolves around a number of relatable scenarios that are often faced by creative professionals living in a metropolitan area and, particularly, queer women in day-to-day life; all with an absurdist edge.
The series’ style incorporates live-action, literal, talking heads imposed over animated bodies and backgrounds; utilising Jessop’s signature collage style, which adds to the surreal nature of the scenes while allowing serious, even very emotionally heavy, topics to be dealt with as comedy sketches.
While the first series tackled subjects ranging from negotiating a new flatshare right up to coming out to your parents, the second series takes the gloves and goes head first into what it’s like to get stuck into an argument with your lesbian partner, everyday harassment in the street, homophobia at the health clinic and the hot topic of mansplaining.
The series has already been picked up by queer streaming service revry.tv and the pilot episode “Parents Chat” (which you can view below) was shortlisted by Toronto WebFest for Best LGBTQ Story. Jessop is proving to be a leading voice in the burgeoning genre of queer animation so start checking the series out now, if you haven’t already.
