Nick Park, Preston’s four-time Oscar winner, has revealed he is working on a secret new film.
And the 52-year-old animator said his most famous clay creations are having an extended break from the limelight.
He said: “Wallace and Gromit are on the backburner slightly.
“You will still see them from time to time, but I’m writing a new feature film.
"It is a totally new idea, but it's top secret at the moment."
Making an appearance at the University of Central Lancashire last week, Park also spoke about his time in Hollywood.
He said he doesn’t attach much importance to the international acclaim and celebrity that comes with making blockbuster films.
“I’ve always been a bit shy,” he said. “I prefer to be the other side of the camera. I could fill up my diary giving talks for the next two years, but I’m happiest getting down and creating something.”
Nick also ended years of speculation over losing Wallace and Gromit in the back of New York cab, denying it was a planned stunt.
In 1995 the missing Plasticine inventions sparked a media frenzy and front-page news.
They turned up 36 hours later when Nick’s taxi driver brought them back to his hotel.
“A lot of people thought it was a publicity stunt. But it wasn’t. It was really genuine.
“It was all a bit ridiculous because it would have been no problem at all to have made them again. That was what was crazy about it.”
Nick isn’t the type for publicity stunts.
For all his involvement with Hollywood, he still considers himself a creator from Preston – not a big-name film writer.
The Curse of the Were-Rabbit and Chicken Run were produced by box-office developers DreamWorks. But Park said he never wanted to lose sense of what his characters were really about.
“On the one hand it was a great learning curve to have the input from DreamWorks. It was fantastic to make a film that works out there in the big theatrical market.
“But, at the same time, I just wanted to keep the integrity of the characters – the fact that they were made by a person.”
Park used to dream of becoming an inventor, but he also experienced the reality of a modest life growing up in Preston.
As a child, he would help his father build things in his shed.
He also revealed that he worked 10 hours a day as a teenager packing chickens and spent two years as a spotlight operator at the city’s Guild Hall.
Nick’s clay invention Wallace and some of the scenes from Chicken Run are inspired by these experiences, and he subsequently struggled to portray his characters in the US.
He added: “I have always felt that, because of my roots up North, it’s hard to tell a story culturally that comes from the UK. There was a natural clash working in Hollywood.”
You can’t imagine Park more out of his comfort zone than in the private jet that Steven Spielberg sent out to pick him up from the Sundance Film Festival in Utah a few years ago.
He quickly realised he would have to pitch an idea for a film to the world-famous director, and scribbled the beginnings of what would be the $45 million Golden Globe-winner Chicken Run.
Park appreciates all the awards he has won, but he was just as delighted with his appearance last month in The Simpsons.
“I was surprised, because who in the US, outside of the animation world, knows who I am?
"I got a letter from the producer and it was a great honour to be asked. I only have three lines!”
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