Comedy series

happens a lot of the time.’’

Mcgee discovered she wanted to be a writer when she was about 9 and became obsessed with Jessica Fletcher, the amateur sleuth portrayed by Angela Lansbury in Murder, She Wrote. ‘‘I thought I was going to be this great crime novelist who solved murders in her spare time,’’ she says.

This preoccupation led to a degree in English and drama at Queen’s University, Belfast, where Mcgee discovered the work of Irish playwright Brian Friel, from Donegal.

‘‘It was the first time I realised you can write about where you’re from and write the way you speak and it can still be very profound,’’ she says.

‘‘Reading his plays, it was the first time I thought our world was interesting as well.’’

After starting a theatre company that put on plays above pubs, she got an agent in London and landed work writing for television, including Being Human, about a group of 20-something monsters.

She created a sitcom, London Irish, that was ‘‘love it or loathe it’’ but gave her the confidence that there would be interest in a show about Northern Ireland.

Mcgee says Derry Girls came easily to her. ‘‘I think I had a lot of material in the back catalogue from my school days.’’

The hardest part was replicating the contradictory sense of community in a place such as Derry, ‘‘where everyone knows your business. We grew up in this scary, violent time, yet no-one locked their doors. It doesn’t make any sense’’.

The series is filmed in Belfast and Derry, which can create some humorous misunderstandings. During production of the first season, Mcgee’s father heard some co-workers saying the British Army had returned. ‘‘And he said, ‘No, that’s my daughter’s TV show,’ ’’ Mcgee laughs. – LA Times

Derry Girls is streaming on Netflix.

Move over Karl Urban, Temuera Morrison and Zoe Bell. A littleknown Kiwi actor who found fame as an international action star is finally getting some longoverdue recognition.

The star of 1980s and 90s Indonesian action movies like The Intruder, The Stabiliser, Forceful Impact, American Hunter and Jungle Heart, Peter O’brian is the subject of a new short documentary Operation: Rambu!

Released as part of this year’s crop of Loading Docs, director Steve Austin’s tale is seven minutes in heaven for fans of cult and cheesy cinema.

Now resident in Tauranga, O’brian comes across as heartfelt and honest as he looks

back on his luck (he was mistaken for Sylvester Stallone while holidaying in Jakarta), some seat-of-the-pants moviemaking and his decision to walk away from that life.

You’ll laugh as he recounts how he blagged his way into his acting career (a wide definition of ‘‘being in drama’’ at school proved handy), recoil as he recalls stunts that would make even Tom Cruise blanch and gasp when clips show off a 1980s hairstyle reminiscent of Queen’s Brian May.

Packing a lot of emotions into its short running time – O’brian is teary-eyed as he remembers a family crisis and ‘‘airport miracle’’ that brought him back to New Zealand – Operation: Rambu! also serves as a showreel for an actor looking for one last great role.

On the evidence of this slick, sweet short, it’s actually O’brian’s story that deserves a longer second take.

Operation: Rambu! is available to view at loadingdocs.net as part of the 2019 Loading Docs collection.