Noah and Saskia facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Noah and Saskia
From left to right: Noah, CGI and real Max Hammer, real and CGI Indy, Saskia
Genre	Teen's
Created by	Patricia Edgar Chris Anastassiades Paul Nichola
Directed by	Pino Amenta
Starring	Jack Blumenau Hannah Greenwood Cameron Nugent Hayden Rathbone Adrian Fergus Fuller Emily Wheaton Alex Yates Maria Papas
Country of origin	United Kingdom Australia
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	13
Production
Executive producer(s)	Patricia Edgar (ABC) Elaine Sperber (BBC)
Producer(s)	Patricia Edgar
Running time	24 minutes
Release
Original network	CBBC ABC
Original release	4 May 2004 (2004-05-04)

Noah and Saskia is a 13-episode TV program initiated, developed and produced by Patricia Edgar for the Australian Children's Television Foundation (ACTF) and the BBC as she stepped down after 20 years as Founding Director of the ACTF. The 13 x 24 minute drama series involves an Australian teenage girl, Saskia, and her internet-based relationship with Noah, a teenage boy living in the United Kingdom. The two characters project their ideal selves to each other in a virtual world, and in the process get a little closer to reaching their ideals in the real one. The show is about the power of someone's essence and how someone can touch you from 10,000 miles away, and change your whole life. Noah & Saskia speaks directly to today's young people about the technologies which are changing the way we communicate.

"I wanted one more crack at producing the type of television I had always believed in; not a formulaic soap-style series; not a co-produced mid-Pacific blancmange, but something that really spoke to adolescents about the issues that were on their minds," Patricia Edgar, Bloodbath: a memoir of Australian Television, pg.399 . “The Internet was the place to set much of the action as this allowed for a modern, contemporary story, which would be new territory for drama. The other appeal of online chat spaces was that they give the characters opportunities to express themselves in multiple ways. The Net is a space where young people are much more at home than their parents and increasingly it will be their world,” Patricia Edgar.

Noah and Saskia commenced production in May 2003. It premiered and screened in Australia on the ABC and in the United Kingdom on the BBC in 2004.

Cast

• Noah King – Jack Blumenau – a socially inexperienced boy from London, England. He lives with his mother, football-loving father and brother and later his cousin Eddie. He runs a webcomic called "Max Hammer", which is based on his life and the people around him. Later in the series, his personality changes into becoming more like Max, such as spending less time online, getting a girlfriend for a time and even playing football.
• Saskia Litras – Hannah Greenwood – A shy, musical girl from Melbourne, Australia. She lives with her single mother, works at the Chicken Coop after school. Her original reason for creating the character of Indy was to confront Max for stealing some of her music illegally, although this leads her to become Noah's partner in his webcomic "Max Hammer". As the series progresses, her personality changes into more like being Indy, such as playing music in public and even becoming more confident at school. At first, she had a crush on Max, but those feelings faded for a time when Max told her he only thought of her as a friend.
• Max Hammer – Cameron Nugent
• Indy – Teiya Moquiuti
• Renee – Emily Wheaton
• Clive – Adrian Fergus Fuller
• Specs – Alex Yates
• Eddie – Eugene Simon
• Deb Litras – Tracy Mann
• Ernesto – Bernard Angel
• Benny – Julian O'Donnell
• Gerald – Damian Neate
• Theresa – Alicia Gardiner

Synopsis

Noah and Saskia is about an internet relationship between two teenagers and its effects on their lives. Although the teenagers deceive each other with "false personas", their relationship is shown to be positive and important. By projecting their ideal selves in a virtual world, the relationship between the two teenagers change each other's lives from opposite sides of the globe.

Saskia goes into an Internet chatroom called Webweave seeking revenge on a guy who stole her music and ends up starting one of the most important relationships of her life. After meeting Max Hammer (the guy who stole her music) for the first time, she feels as though she has known him her entire life. He appears to know all that is going on in her head, her music and best of all, her soul. Max Hammer is strong, smart, sensible and sensitive (all the S's) and sees those qualities in Saskia herself. Saskia feels that her new relationship with Max Hammer is absolutely perfect, except for the fact that he's in the UK and she's in Australia...and that he thinks she's someone else entirely. Saskia goes by the online name of Indy, and she finds that her alter ego allows her to express aspects of her personality that she is uncomfortable with or unable to express normally. Indy is confident where as Saskia is nervous and shy. By asking herself "What would Indy do?", Saskia learns to be more assertive and, in some ways, becomes Indy herself. Saskia knows that her relationship with Max would be over if he ever found out that she was actually a 14 year old dork, but Max Hammer isn't who he claims to be either. Turns out he's actually a 14 year old science dweeb called Noah who knows that Indy would run screaming if she ever learned the truth about Max Hammer.

"'Noah & Saskia' is about a little lie that leads to a bigger truth – that who you say you are is usually who you want to be." [1]

Many novels, films and books that deal with internet relationships depict them as dangerous, especially for teenagers. The more balanced view put forth in Noah and Saskia has been welcomed by many people who have experienced internet friendships firsthand. [2]

Success

In 2002, Patricia Edgar stood down as Director after 20 years to focus on the production of Noah and Saskia, which was to be an outstanding program and her parting gift to the ACTF.

In May 2004, the series attracted approximately 60% of the 5-12 year old viewing audience and approximately 40% of the 13-17 year old audience, lifting the overall ratings in that time slot for the ABC. The series performed particularly well in the Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth markets, the latter averaging over 75% of all viewers between 5-12 year olds.

The series was released internationally at MIP TV with immediate impact in 2004. The series sold to BBC Canada (Canada) and Cartoon Network (for India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Maldives, Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka). Noah & Saskia video/DVD, publishing and music rights were sold to ABC Enterprises (Australia).

Noah & Saskia screened at the 2004 Chicago Film Festival in the Live-Action Television Category. The series was selected from 700 entries from around the world. The Chicago International Children's Film Festival (CICFF) is the world's largest and oldest annual festival of films for children and features over 200 of the best live-action and animated films from 40 countries. The Festival's aim is to empower children with knowledge from viewing quality and culturally diverse films. The nominated programs were screened and judged by a child audience along with the official Festival panel.

Noah & Saskia was nominated for two Australian Film Institute (AFI) Awards and won an Australian Writers’ Guild (AWGIE) Award. The two AFI nominations were for ‘Best Children’s Television Drama Award’ and ‘Outstanding Achievement in Craft in Television Award’ for animation and digital effects.

On the 22 October 2004, Sam Carroll, co-writer of Noah & Saskia, won the AWGIE Award for ‘Best Children’s Television Drama’ (C Classification) for the episode “Extra Spicy”. The announcement was made at the Regent Theatre in Melbourne during the 37th Annual AWGIE Awards. The AWGIE Awards honour excellence in screen, television, stage and radio writing. They are unique in being the only writers’ awards judged solely by writers. Although Sam had script edited many hours of television, this was her first script to be produced.

Visual Effects Director, Paul Nichola brought together the combined skills of the ACTF's New Media development team and Melbourne-based animation and effects studio Unreal pictures. In addition to traditional animation and visual effects techniques such as CGI, motion capture and split-screen, the team adapted the ACTF's ground-breaking animation software Kahootz to create a unique look for scenes set in the webweave chat space.

The series written jointly by Chris Anastassiades and Sam Carroll also received an ‘Honourable Mention’ at the 2004 Chris Awards at the Columbus International Film & Video Festival. Honourable Mention is recognition given to productions receiving a final score of 5 on a 7-point rating scale, meaning the judging panel found it to be of significant value and merit.

Website

ABC New Media created a website, at noahandsaskia.com, to complement the television series. The website went live on 3 May 2004. Visitors to the website were able to create their own “Max hammer” comics, experience the “webweave” online environment and create music online.

Merchandise

A Noah & Saskia book, published by ABC Books and a DVD set, complete with entertaining extras, was available in ABC shops and ABC centres from the middle of May 2004.

Along with a novel and accompanying teaching resources, Noah and Saskia is a unique educational package for English text studies, multiliteracies, Internet issues, media production and ICTs. Curriculum resources, developed in partnership with the Australian Literacy Educators’ Association (ALEA) and the Australian Association for the Teaching of English (AATE) included:

• English and multiliteracies lessons
• The entire production process from script to screen available on CD-ROM and at the learning Centre at www.actf.com.au
• Trailer and extra scenes on the DVD

The ACTF released its educational package of Noah & Saskia for Australian schools with all 13 episodes available on video and DVD. As a special feature for the education sector, the DVD includes “The Making of Noah & Saskia”. A CD-ROM completes the educational package detailing the production process in “From Script to Screen” plus comprehensive lesson plans, worksheets, video clips and TV scripts.

Awards & Nominations

Also known as

• Um Par Quase Perfeito (Brazilian Portuguese)
• Ной и Саския (Russian)