'Germain et Nous' and 'The Smurfs'.
Thierry Culliford is a Belgian comic writer who has been continuing the legacy of his father, the comic creator Peyo. Since the 1980s, he has been involved in the merchandise projects related to his father's creations, as well as the continuation of the comic series. As a scriptwriter, Culliford has penned new stories with classic characters like 'The Smurfs' and 'Benoît Brisefer'. Earlier in his career, Thierry Culliford was the first scriptwriter of Frédéric Jannin's gag comic 'Germain et Nous...' (1977-1979).
Early life
Thierry Culliford was born in 1955 in the Brussels suburb of Uccle. He was raised into an artistic environment, as his father was was Pierre Culliford, also known as Peyo, the creator of the comic series 'Johan and Peewit', 'The Smurfs' and 'Benoît Brisefer' ('Steven Strong', or 'Benny Breakiron') for the comic magazine Spirou. Thierry's mother, Nine Culliford, was a colorist for these comics. Several classic authors from the Golden Age of Spirou magazine frequently visited the family home, such as André Franquin, Maurice Tillieux, Jijé and Yvan Delporte, as did many of his father's co-workers, most notably Gos and François Walthéry. Both Thierry and his sister Véronique later became involved in the popular franchises created by their father.
Germain et Nous...
Thierry Culliford was in his early twenties when he started writing comic scripts. In 1977, Yvan Delporte and André Franquin established an unusual comic supplement in the magazine Spirou, titled Le Trombone Illustré. It featured comedy appealing more to young adults, in sharp contrast with the more family-oriented content in the rest of Spirou's pages. One such feature was the gag comic 'Germain et Nous...' (1977-1992), a humorous comic about a group of teenagers and their typical adolescent issues. The gag writer was Thierry Culliford and his childhood friend Frédéric Jannin provided the artwork. Culliford remained the comic's scriptwriter from 1977 and 1979, also after Le Trombone Illustré was cancelled and 'Germain et Nous...' continued in Spirou's regular pages. Afterwards, Jannin started writing the gags himself, sometimes in collaboration with Serge Honorez and Yvan Delporte. Culliford's run on the strip was collected in the first and the fifth album of the series published respectively in 1979 and 1984.
For their 'Germain et nous...' comic, Culliford and Jannin were awarded the 1978 Prix Saint-Michel for new talent at the Comic Festival of Angoulême.
First part of Culliford's strip for 'Er Waren Eens... Belgen'. Dutch-language version.
The Bowling Balls
In addition to creating comics, Thierry Culliford and Frédéric Jannin were also in a novelty band together, The Bowling Balls. The project started as a gag, as The Bowling Balls was the fictional post-punk/synthpop band that the characters in the 'Germain... et Nous' comic were fans of. When their comic series was launched, the two creators decided to construct a narrative around the group, and present it as an actual band. Joining in on the hoax were their friends Christian Lanckvrind and Bert Bertrand, a music journalist and the son of Le Trombone editor Yvan Delporte. Thierry's father Peyo played the role of Jack Grodikski, the group's supposed producer and manager. In November 1978, the rock magazine En Attendant published a faux interview with The Bowling Balls, followed by more bogus ephemera, including a press kit, photoshoots, and record covers. It wasn't until 1 April 1979 before the group actually released some music on the EMI Belgium label, the 7" single 'God Save The Night Fever', spoofing 'God Save The Queen' by Sex Pistols and 'Night Fever' by the Bee Gees. Between 1980 and 1983, the group released more music on the Ariola label, including the singles 'When You Walk in the Room' (a Del Shannon cover, 1980), 'You Don't Know What It's Like To Be Alone In The House' (1981) and 'The Boys/The Girls' (1981). In addition, they appeared live on the RTBF TV shows 'Génération 80' and 'RTBF Follies', as well as the Pepperland comic store in Brussels. Lacking true musicianship, their performances were characterized by comedy routines and onstage eccentricities.
Following the suicide of band member Bert Bertrand in February 1983, the remaining members decided to release the band's sole album in his memory, the aptly titled 'First & Last Album For The Same Price', featuring all four singles and several new songs.
Other early work
As an artist, Culliford created a comic page for the anthology book 'Il Était Une Fois... Les Belges'/'Er Waren Eens... Belgen' (Lombard, 1980), a collection of columns and comic pages published at the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Belgium. His particular story was based on a real-life anecdote about a journalist who was once invited to a late-night orgy and specifically told to appear in the nude, wearing only a tie. When the reporter entered the room, however, it turned out he had been tricked! All he saw was a very stuffy business party, with fully dressed and slightly embarrassed ladies and gentlemen.
Second part.
Studio Peyo
Starting in 1983, Culliford has been mainly involved in his father's comic creations. In that decade, the international success of the 'Smurfs' and the acquisition of the publishing house Dupuis by a Brussels banking group, led to a reorganization of Peyo's activities. By the end of the decade, Peyo had left his publisher Dupuis, and production and publishing was continued by the Brussels-based art studio and publishing imprint Cartoon Creation, led by Thierry Culliford. Its goal was to produce artwork for merchandising with The Smurfs, as well as the Smurfs theme park in Maizières-lès-Metz, France. A separate company run by Thierry's sister Véronique, IMPS, was already handling the business and legal aspects of Peyo's creations.
Affiliated artists with Cartoon Creation were Daniel Desorgher, Bernard Swysen, Philippe Delzenne, Alain Maury, Pascal Garray, Eric Closter, José Grandmont and Luc Parthoens. In addition to producing commercial artwork, Cartoon Creation launched a Smurfs magazine, the monthly Schtroumpf (1990-1992), and released two new 'Smurfs' albums and a remake of Peyo's 1960s comic cretaion 'Pierrot et la Lampe' ("Pierrot and the Lamp", 1990-1991). In 1992, the publishing rights of the Smurfs and Peyo's other creations were sold to the Brussels-based publisher Le Lombard, after which Thierry Culliford began to focus on scriptwriting. Cartoon Creation was dissolved and the graphic studio was implemented in IMPS, which is since then managed by Véronique Culliford in the Walloon Brabant town of Genval.
In the meantime, Thierry Culliford worked together with his father on the script of what would become Peyo's swan song, 'Le Schtroumpf Financier' (1992). It was meant to be a return to the original album series, which contained more layered social satire, instead of plain children's stories. Since his father's death in 1992, Culliford has written many new albums in the series, sometimes in collaboration with Luc Parthoens or Alain Jost. Artists for these new productions have been Alain Maury, Pascal Garray, Ludo Borecki, Jeroen De Coninck and Miguel Díaz Vizoso.
'Benoît Brisefer' and 'Johan and Peewit'.
Besides 'The Smurfs', Thierry Culliford was also involved in the relaunch of two of Peyo's other classic series. Between 1993 and 2015, he has written several irregularly appearing new albums with 'Benoît Brisefer', the little boy with immense strength. Artist on duty was Pascal Garray, who also participated in the scriptwork. Additional co-scriptwriters on the series have been Frédéric Jannin, Dugomier and Luc Parthoens. Between 1994 and and 2001, Culliford also co-wrote four albums of Peyo's medieval series 'Johan et Pirlouit' with Yvan Delporte and Luc Parthoens, drawn by Alain Maury.
Together with Luc Parthoens, Culliford has also scripted episodes in the spin-off series 'Les Schtroumpfs & le Village des Filles' (2017- ), set within the narrative of the 2017 animated feature film 'Smurfs: The Lost Village'. Laurent Cagniat provided most of the artwork for the series.
In addition to comics, Thierry Culliford has also been a lyricist and composer for some of the 'Smurfs' house music albums relaesed in the 1990s.
The Bowling Balls (Fred Jannin, Thierry Culliford, Christian Lanckvrind, Bert Bertand).