A young friend of mine who is a film buff was watching early episodes of Red Dwarf. He noticed a character who looked strangely familiar. The next time the postie came to deliver mail, my friend told him he looked a lot like George McIntyre from the Red Dwarf series. As it turned out, the postie was Brit Rob McCulley who had played that very part in the first episode of Red Dwarf.

Not too much time later, both my friend and Rob had acting credits in a new film – The Insatiable Moon. Rob McCulley was a late addition to the cast, and inherited what is basically a non-speaking role as a boarding house resident, Sandy. Within a short space of time, Rob built the character of Sandy so that he became a natural comedian and something of a scene-stealer. Once the camera started rolling, you could never be sure what kind of antics Rob would come up with, but you knew he would be consistently good. His physical comedy was in the ilk of the great silent stars of the screen.

Rob was another of the boarding house guys who brought so much to the film, and had a whale of a time doing it. No matter how many times I’ve seen the film (and I’ve stopped counting now), I still laugh when Sandy gets up to his tricks. Rob is one of those actors who is able to take a role with both hands and develop it with all sorts of idiosyncracities and embellishments, thereby bringing a little magic to the part. By doing it he lifted what could have been a background character to the fore. Sheer brilliance!

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