CRAIG Charles, star of BBC's Red Dwarf series, will appear in court at

Southwark Crown Court today, charged with rape.

Mr Charles, 30, of Tyers Street, Kennington, south London, was granted

bail in October on condition that he stayed with relatives in Liverpool.

He is jointly charged with company director John Peploe, 36, of

Keswick House, Crawford Road, Camberwell, south London.

Mr Charles was arrested in July last year, accused of the rape of a

38-year-old woman at a flat in Clapham, south London.

During the three months he was in custody, the actor claims to have

been the victim of several assaults.

The Mersey-born comedian was working on the sixth series of Red Dwarf,

in which he plays super slob Dave Lister, the curry-loving last human in

the universe.

The series attracted an audience of seven million and became a cult

show in the United States.

A former pupil at West Derby comprehensive school, Liverpool, Mr

Charles was influenced by the poetry of Roger McGough and Adrian Henri,

and he began writing his own poems.

He had his first taste of showbusiness by gatecrashing a pop concert

by Teardrop Explodes in 1982, invading the stage and grabbing the

microphone to deliver some of his poems.

At the age of 21, he sent a video of himself performing his poems to

Channel 4's black arts programme Black on Black, which led to

appearances on Ned Sherrin's Radio 4 programme Loose Ends. He also

became a regular on the Terry Wogan Show.

His acting debut was in Business As Usual with Liverpool barrister's

daughter Cathy Tyson, whom he had married at 19. The couple had a son,

now aged seven, but the marriage broke up in 1989.

He was one of the original presenters of the LWT show Night Network

and he also starred as a mass murderer in the BBC drama series, The

Marksman.