Wallace Wallace lives with his pet dog Gromit at No. 62 West Wallaby Street in
Wigan, England. He usually wears brown woollen trousers, a white shirt with detachable sleeves, and a red tie under a green
vee-necked knitted
sleeveless sweater. He is fond of cheese, especially
Wensleydale, with crackers. Nick Park, his creator, said: "He's a very self-contained figure. A very homely sort who doesn't mind the odd adventure." He is loosely based on Park's father and Park has never made it clear as to whether Wallace is the character's forename or surname, preferring to leave this ambiguous. Wallace was voiced by
Peter Sallis until his retirement in 2010, being succeeded by
Ben Whitehead. Wallace is an inveterate inventor, creating
elaborate contraptions that often do not work wholly as intended. Their appearance is similar to the illustrations of
W. Heath Robinson and
Rube Goldberg, where Nick Park has said of Wallace that all his inventions are designed around the principle of using a "sledge-hammer to crack a nut". Some of Wallace's contraptions are based on real-life inventions. For example, his method of waking up in the morning uses a bed that tips up to wake up its owner, an invention that was exhibited at the
Great Exhibition of 1851 by
Theophilus Carter. Wallace has had three romantic interests. The first was wool shop owner Wendolene Ramsbottom, which ended quickly when Wendolene told Wallace that she was allergic to some cheese. The second was Lady Campanula Tottington in
The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, whom Wallace fondly calls "Totty". In
A Matter of Loaf & Death, Wallace becomes engaged to Piella Bakewell, who turns out to be a serial killer of bakers.
Gromit Gromit is a dog with a cream-coloured short-hair
coat and oversized, floppy, dark brown ears, who is Wallace's pet and best friend. He is very intelligent, having graduated from "Dogwarts University" ("Dogwarts" being a pun on "
Hogwarts", the wizard school from the
Harry Potter books) with a
double first in Engineering for Dogs. He likes knitting, playing chess, reading the newspaper, tea, and cooking. His prized possessions include his alarm clock, dog bone, brush, and a framed photo of himself with Wallace. He is very adept with electronic equipment and an excellent aeroplane pilot. He often threatens the plans of the antagonists he and Wallace encounter in their adventures. Sometimes, Gromit ignores Wallace's orders, such as in
A Close Shave and
Shopper 13, where Wallace orders him to get rid of Shaun but Gromit does not. Gromit's birthday is 12 February. In
The Wrong Trousers, he is seen circling the date on a calendar. Gromit has no visible mouth and expresses himself through facial expressions and body language.
Peter Hawkins originally intended to voice Gromit, but Park dropped the idea when he realised how Gromit's thoughts and feelings could be displayed through movement with some canine noises on rare occasions. Many critics believe that Gromit's silence makes him the perfect
straight man, with a
pantomime expressiveness that drew favourable comparisons to
Buster Keaton. He does at times make dog-like noises, such as yelps and growling. According to the fortieth anniversary documentary
A Grand Night In: The Story of Aardman, Gromit was originally supposed to be a cat, but the idea was dropped as Park realised that animating a dog was easier. Generally speaking, Gromit's tastes are more in vogue than those of Wallace; this being one of the many ways they contrast with each other as characters. Gromit seems to have a significant interest in encyclopaedic, classical and philosophical literature, and popular culture, including film and music.
Electronics for Dogs has been a firm favourite since
A Grand Day Out, and in
The Wrong Trousers Gromit's bookshelves feature titles such as
Kites,
Sticks,
Sheep,
Penguins,
Rockets,
Bones and
Stars, while he is seen reading
The Republic, by Pluto (a nod to the
Disney character of the same name and a pun on
Plato) and
Crime and Punishment, by Fido Dogstoyevsky (a pun on
Fyodor Dostoyevsky). Gromit's various possessions make extensive use of puns:
A Matter of Loaf and Death features "
Pup Fiction" (
Pulp Fiction), "
The Dogfather" (
The Godfather), "
Where Beagles Dare" (
Where Eagles Dare), "
Bite Club" (
Fight Club) and "
The Bone Identity" (
The Bourne Identity) all as book titles, and "
Citizen Canine" (
Citizen Kane) as a film poster. In
Vengeance Most Fowl, he is shown reading ''A Room of One's Own
, by "Virginia Woof" (a pun on Virginia Woolf), and Paradise Lost'', by "John Stilton" (a pun on
John Milton). His taste in music has been shown to cover
Bach (presumably punning on "bark"), "Poochini" (a play on
Puccini), "McFlea" (
McFly), "The Beagles" (
the Beatles), "Red Hot Chili Puppies" (
Red Hot Chili Peppers), "
Puppy Love" by Doggy Osmond (
Donny Osmond), "The Hound of Music" (
The Sound of Music) and
"Walkies on the Wild Side" by Rod Lead. Gromit gains his own love interest in
A Matter of Loaf and Death, when he becomes attached to Fluffles, a poodle.
NASA named one of its new prototype
Mars explorer robots after Gromit in 2005. On 1 April 2007,
HMV announced that Gromit would stand in for
Nipper for a three-month period, promoting children's DVDs in its UK stores. In the
Cracking Contraptions episode "
The Soccamatic", Wallace says to Gromit, "How do you like my
Preston North End soccamatic, Gromit?". The episode references famous English footballers of the 1950s and '60s, including
Nobby Stiles,
Tom Finney and
Bill Shankly (all of whom played for Preston in their careers) as well as
Geoff Hurst and
Stanley Matthews. The nostalgic quality of
Wallace & Gromit world has been compared to 1950s
Beanotown. ==Filmography==