Sweep (puppet)

Sweep is a British puppet and television character popular in the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand and other countries.

Sweep (right) and Sooty

Sweep is a grey glove puppet dog with long black ears who joined The Sooty Show in 1957, as a friend to fellow puppet Sooty.[1] He is a dim-witted dog with a penchant for bones and sausages.[2][3] Sweep is notable for his method of communication[4] which consists of a loud high-pitched squeak that gains its inflection from normal speech and its rhythm from the syllables in each word.

The rest of the cast, namely Soo and the presenter, could understand Sweep perfectly, and would (albeit indirectly) translate for the viewer.[5][6] The sound of Sweep's voice was achieved using a saxophone reed.[7] Versions of the puppet later sold as toys had an integral squeaker connected to an air bulb that was squeezed by hand.

Sweep's family first appeared on the Sooty Show in an episode called "Sweep's Family". He has a mother and father; a twin brother, Swoop; two cousins, Swipe and Swap[8] and another seven brothers in the litter (all of whom look exactly like him, and wear different coloured collars to tell each other apart).

Swipe and Swap are described as Sweep's brothers in the Sooty & Co. episode "Sweep's Family" and the Sooty Heights episode "The Hounds of Music".

Voice actors

References
  1. The Newsroom (11 September 2018). "Half-term fun for fans of Sooty at Blackpool's Grand Theatre". Blackpool Gazette. Blackpool, England: JPIMedia. Archived from the original on 5 September 2021. Retrieved 5 September 2021. It features the glove puppet characters Sooty, Sweep (who first appeared in 1957)
  2. Croft, Malcolm (14 August 2014). "Sweep". Super Dogs: Heart-warming Adventures of the World's Greatest Dogs (Paperback). Summersdale Publishers. ISBN 978-1849536226. Retrieved 5 September 2021. Sweep, Sooty's silly sidekick and lover of bones and sausages
  3. Moore, Matthew (30 August 2018). "What's that, Sooty? You're back on TV for a new generation of children?". The Times (subscription required). Times Newspapers. Archived from the original on 30 August 2018. Retrieved 5 September 2021. Sooty first appeared on television in 1952 and was soon joined by his companions Sweep, a squeaky dog who loves bones and sausages, and Soo, Sooty's panda girlfriend.
  4. Tryhorn, Chris (26 June 2008). "Sooty sale heralds new series". The Guardian. Guardian News and Media. Archived from the original on 16 September 2015. Retrieved 7 September 2021. He would get into scrapes with Sweep, who spoke only in squeaks, the sensible Soo, and - in more recent series - his schoolboy cousin Scampi.
  5. Goldman, Laurence (1996). "What's that you said Sooty? Puppets, parlance and pretence" (PDF). Academia.edu. p. 3. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 September 2021. Retrieved 6 September 2021. However the majority, but interestingly not all, of Sweep's squeaks are subject to a similar 'translation' on the part of Corbett and Soo.
  6. Tims, Anna (6 August 2012). "How we made: Brenda Longman and Matthew Corbett on The Sooty Show". The Guardian. Guardian News and Media. Archived from the original on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 5 September 2021. Soo, who translates Sooty and Sweep's noises, didn't say much until I came along.
  7. The Newsroom (5 September 2018). "Wigan man Phil swaps Hacker for Sweep to realise his dreams". Wigan Post. Wigan, England: JPIMedia. Retrieved 5 September 2021. Phil revealed that Sweep gets a proper script and that he uses something similar to a saxophone reed to speak the part, making sure listeners can get a gist of all the syllables.
  8. MacKenzie, Steven (26 July 2018). "Izzy-wizzy, let's get busy! 70 facts about Sooty as he celebrates 70 years!". The Big Issue. London, England: The Big Issue Company. Archived from the original on 26 July 2018. Retrieved 5 September 2021. Sweep has three brothers – Swoop, Swipe and Swap
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