Five minutes with... Craig Charles

Original cast member Craig Charles tells Gemma Dunn more about Red Dwarf's latest outing.

Craig Charles and the rest of the gang are back in transit as fan favourite Red Dwarf returns with a feature-length special. He tells Gemma Dunn what's in store, plus reflects on his 'career-defining' role as Lister.

Red Dwarf is back - but not as fans had expected.

For rather than a full series, its latest outing - titled Red Dwarf: The Promised Land - offers up a 90-minute Dave special recorded in front of a live studio audience at the world-famous Pinewood Studios.

Marking the 13th chapter of the legendary sci-fi comedy, the feature-length episode reunites the original cast of Chris Barrie (Rimmer), Craig Charles (Lister), Danny John-Jules (Cat) and Robert Llewellyn (Kryten) - plus sees the return of Holly (Norman Lovett), the much-loved ship's computer.

So what are the group of misfits up to now?

According to a synopsis, the film will see "the posse meet three cat clerics (Tom Bennett, Mandeep Dhillon, Lucy Pearman) who worship Lister as their God. Lister vows to help them as they're being hunted by Rodon, the ruthless feral cat leader (Ray Fearon) who has vowed to wipe out all cats who worship anyone but him".

Charles, 55, tells us more...

This special has been a long time coming for fans...

Yeah.

It's something slightly different and breaking new ground in many ways. It's just a new way of doing it. But it's a great story and there are some fantastic performances in it and I'm not talking about me by the way, I'm talking about other people. I wouldn't write my own reviews! But it was a really nice thing to do.

How do your working relationships compare to others?

I've known this group of people longer than I've known my family. My mum and dad are dead, my older brother is dead; these are the longest human relationships that I've ever had with anyone. And they've been with me through thick and thin, stood by me in good times and bad times. They're the kind of people I feel so lucky I got to know. I've hung on to their coat tails and let them be funny while I bask in their reflected glory!

Do you all find it easy to slip back into character?

Chris will hate me for saying this, but we're kind of caricatures of our own personalities in many ways.

So there's an awful lot of Dave Lister about me and there's an awful lot of Arnold Rimmer about Chris. Robert Llewellyn is full of that middleclass guilt and Danny is the vainest man I've ever met without any reason to be!

I think that's why it works in many ways because none of us are really stretching that much for our characters - we're kind of set in place.

Who's changed the most since your first outing 32

years ago?

I suppose I have really. I'm very different from when it started; I was 23 when I started playing Dave Lister and I'm 55 now. I came from absolutely nothing, a council estate in Liverpool, and I live a completely different life now.

You've worked on many shows. Does this feel like home to you?

I've come to realise throughout the years that Dave Lister is my career-defining role. You're going to get typecast and I don't mind being typecast as Dave Lister, he's such a pleasure to play.

I did 10 years of Coronation Street and Robot Wars for years, and Takeshi's Castle and all these things that have been iconic TV shows, but people still call me 'Smeg-head' in the street.

So it must have felt good when you first made a return?

Yeah we stopped doing it in about 1999 and we didn't come back until about 2010, so we had about 11 years off.

I was just getting on with my life, raising my kids, and thought 'What a great legacy; hopefully they'll watch it one day and say 'Dad looks so young'!'

But then we came back with the Coronation Street plot and I think it stoked the fire in all our belies to say, 'Guys come on, this is too good to let go. Let's do some more'.

Will there be more red dwarf?

I don't know. Robert is so old and decrepit; he's breaking down that lad. I'm the only one with hair now! I'd love to do more; it's one of those things that you don't want to let go but you don't want to outstay your welcome. And it would be a shame to mess up the legacy of what we've done by turning out inferior work. But I think we're on our game. If Robert wants to get in the mask, if Doug wants to write and direct more, if the budget is there, I'm certainly willing. There's so much to look at and so much fun to be had and let's face it the whole world is going to hell in a handcart, so everyone needs a laugh!