Stage Fright (1997 film)

Stage Fright is an Aardman Animations stopmotion animated short film produced, directed, and cowritten by Steve Box. Tess Daulton is also an uncredited cowriter. The story follows Tiny, a music hall vaudeville performer, Arnold Hugh, a silent film actor, and Tinys coworker Daphne Fellows, as they attempt to adjust to the coming age of film. All three characters are voiced by Graham Fellows. The movie is eleven minutes in length, and won a BAFTA Award for Best Short Animated Film in 1998.

Years earlier, Tiny had found one of his dogs missing while performing his traineddog act in the theater. Even though he fears that the crowd no longer likes the act, his friend Daphne encourages him to go on with the show. He is booed off the stage in favor of a silent movie, which stars Arnold and Daphne and features the missing dog, taken by Daphne. Arnold pressures her not to tell Tiny about the theft and goes on to make a string of successful movies with Daphne and the dogs.Tiny has now trained them to jump up and place a boater on his head at his command. When Arnold uses this trick in one of his movies, though, it fails because he is taller than Tiny he angrily confronts Tiny and threatens to torture the animals unless they can reach his height. Angered, Tiny retrains them to attack instead, prompting Arnold to leave the studio for the confrontation seen at the beginning of the film. Daphne decides that she no longer wants to work with Arnold and follows him to the theater. ........

Source: Wikipedia