Fingerbobs ( TV Series 1972 )

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Plot

Charming finger puppet series with Yoffy (Jones) telling stories featuring Fingermouse, Scampi, Gulliver the Seagull, and other animal characters.

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Fingerbobs was a British children's television programme made by the BBC in 1972. The first episode was broadcast on 14 February 1972 on BBC1 as part of Watch with Mother. The show was created by Joanne and Michael Cole, who also created Bod. Only thirteen episodes were ever made.

Presented by mime artist "Yoffy" (played by Canadian actor Rick Jones), each ten-minute episode told a story centred around a paper finger puppet animal, and usually involved collecting various items (such as pebbles or feathers) to make up another object at the end. The finger puppets, each of whom had their own song, included:

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Fingermouse - a mouse, consisting of a grey paper cone head with paper ears and whiskers with a grey glove for the body ("Fingermouse, Fingermouse/I am a sort of wondermouse"). Fingermouse later got his own show, with a new puppeteer, called "The Music Man". The Music Man would tell stories involving Fingermouse, using musical instruments.
Gulliver - a seagull made from a white ping-pong ball (head) placed over a thumb and white gloves forming the body with outstretched fingers as the wings. ("I spread my wings.")
Scampi - several scampi were made using purple gloves with red heads on each finger
Flash - a tortoise, with a paper shell. ("Slowly, steadily, I move at my own pace/They call me Flash though I won't dash/Who wants to run a race?")
Fingermouse gained his own series in 1985. In this series, the focus was more on musical instruments. One series was made of thirteen programmes.

The memorable theme tune went "Yoffy lifts a finger, and a mouse is there/Puts his hands together, and a seagull takes the air/Yoffy lifts a finger, and a scampi darts about/Yoffy bends another, and a tortoise head peeps out/These hands were made for making, and making they must do."

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At the end of the series Jones was so sick of making the show that he destroyed the finger puppets while the camera was still rolling.​

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Episodes

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Series 1 (1972)

1. Bumpy

2. Stones

3. Feathers

4. Sounds

5. Wood

6. Shiny

7. String

8. Shadow

9. Shapes

10. Bricks

11. Paint

12. Seeds

13. House

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Characters​

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Yoffi     ​

(played by Rick Jones) As mentioned Yoffi was a storyteller, who seemed to wear the same turtlenecked sweater each episode. Maybe he was a bit lazy, but he would never collect any of the items himself, so was the brains of the operation, not the brawn. His talent for arranging items into a living story is amazing and he should have joined Tony Hart or the Art Attack crew for future adventures.   ​

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Fingermouse    ​

(voiced by Rick Jones) He was Yoffi's main helper and some will say the star of the show. As his name suggests, he was a mouse...a very quick and speedy mouse (he loved to sing about getting past cats with his famous body swerve). He is so persausive that he even got a headgehog to roll down a hill to help pick up all the feathers he wanted. Most hedgehogs would have said 'on your bike' and told him to pick them up himself.  ​

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Scampy    ​

(voiced by Rick Jones) Scampy is another one of Yoffi's helpers. He gathers up items from under the sea (such as sponges) and around the beach areas. If things are taking too long to gather up, then he asks 'his girls' to gather them up, while he takes a rest (the lazy devil!).    Enoch     (voiced by Rick Jones)Another helper is Enoch, the woodpecker, who has a rather funny name for a woodpecker (sounds like - 'He Knock'). He is very good at organising things and not surprisingly he likes creating things out of wood. He even knocked up a four wheels to make a cart, to carry some pebbles Fingermouse had collected. But as soon as the cart needed loading, Enoch buzzed off leaving Fingermouse to load the cart all on his own (the cad!).

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Gulliver     

(voiced by Rick Jones) Not content with one bird, Yoffi conscripted another, Gulliver, and Italian seagull. When he takes off he loves to sing his song, but unlike most Italian singers, he's terrible! When he see an item for the story, he doesn't give up till he gets it. Such as the time he wanted a Peacock feather. He basically camped out until the Peacock gave him a feather (poor Peacock just wanted to be left in peace).   

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Flash     

(voiced by Rick Jones) What a name for a tortoise and how useful he is when collecting items, as he can take his shell off to carry things. Flash is content to take his time with things and not rush. Once he left his shell off hoping to catch the feathers from the birds in the trees, but instead they used his shell as a nest and put feathers in it to get comfortable. As you can tell, they weren't happy when he asked for his shell back.