Great Expectations No.2 A Bird in the Hand:

For Rod Hull & Emu (Sheppey)

Bronze

4.5cm x 7cm x 18cm

Edition of 5

£750 

Rod Hull was born on Sheppey in 1935 and growing up always dreamed of becoming an actor.

He later moved to Australia and began work as a lighting technician with TCN Channel 9 in Sydney and eventually started appearing on air, notably as Constable Clot in Channel 9's slapstick comedy series Kaper Kops. It was in Australlia that Rod found and started performing with his Emu puppet. From this point on Rod rarely appeared without Emu, a mute and highly aggressive arm-length puppet modelled on the Australian bird.

Emu brought Rod huge fame both in Britain and in America where he performed anarchic routines on chat shows. He appeared regularly on Television in the 1970s and 1980s and became wealthy.

In the late 1980s Hull bought Restoration House in Rochester, a huge 38 room Grade 1 listed property (which was the original inspiration for Miss Haversham’s House in Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations.) Purchasing Restoration House saved it from being turned into a car park, but the cost of renovations and an unpaid tax bill, along with fewer TV appearances resulted in bankruptcy for Hull in 1994.

Rod Hull relocated to a tiny one storey shepherd's cottage in East Sussex. Hull died penniless in the cottage: on the night of 17 March 1999, he was trying to adjust the television aerial on the roof of his bungalow at half-time during an Inter Milan vs. Manchester United Champions League match, when he slipped and fell.

Upon Hull's death, Michael Parkinson reminisced that he had found him to be "a very charming, intelligent, and sensitive man – quite unlike the Emu." He observed that the puppet "was the dark side of Rod's personality, and very funny, provided it was not on top of you."