Ratfans.com:- Hi Roland! Thank you for taking time to speak to Ratfans.com from California.
Roland:- My pleasure, this is a fab site and your hard work on ‘ere is much appreciated yeahhhh! 

Where are you hanging out these days?
Kev, Errol and Little Reggie are here with me in RATCAVE2 under the Hollywood sign, in
Los Angeles where I spend most of me time these days. Of course I jet back and forth to London... Bit like the Beckham’s but with more intelligence!

Why spend so much time in America?
Well, I have a company here, I luv the warm weather and my agent is in L.A. too. RRETVinc makes other programs too.

After 27 yrs being a Superstar what new projects are in the pipeline?
I am a Superstar yer right, yeahhh and to confirm that fact there will be lot’s of new rat goodies in the shops like the new ‘Rat On The Road’ DVD which is part of a new series of ‘Rat Tapes’ cataloguing our hundreds of TV series over the years. That’s also available as a download from iTunes too!

Then we’ve got the new soft toys of me in 2 sizes, a large talkin’ one and a smaller one with sucker pads on me paws to stick in yer car.

A new range of clothing featuring tee shirts, sweat pants, socks, boxer shorts all of which are by George at ASDA. A Roland Rat dress up costume for parties is also comin’ soon.

Any TV planned? We want you back on TV Roland!!
I wanna be back on TV too but as I have mentioned many times a TV station has to commission a series first. We have many formats that could be picked up, 2011 we hope to have a new series on air or streaming online which to me is the future!

Any dates pencilled in for iTunes album releases?
I’m afraid it’s gonna be sometime in 2011!!
 
With the Rat On The Road DVD available, what are your thoughts on the next DVD release?
We are looking at L.A. RAT as the next possible release, it’s all to do with re-edits and while I’m in L.A. it’s difficult for me to edit old material. Not sure yet what series it will be....watch this space ...Ratfans.com will hear the news first of course!

We would love to know a bit about the merchandise process; how many prototypes are made, how long does it take, etc
Well we first decide on what licenses we are looking to explore, then work with that company on designing and creating the product. I am very hands on so everything has to come to me for approval each step of the way.
The DVD sleeve had numerous changes. The soft toy also had a lot of remakes. The prototypes are made then sent from the Orient to me for comments and changes. We then send those back and wait for the next sample. Everything is down to cost and a lot of the time ya can’t do it exactly as ya want cus it’ll cost too much to produce... then the stores won’t take it if it’s too expensive! We design loads and loads of different t shirt artwork and then out of those designs one or two are finally used.

Is there anything you want to see made with you on that isn't already out there? Life size replica for instance?
A life size repliker of me! I like it yeahhh, fab!!
There’s lot’s of stuff I would like to see myself on yeahhh....skateboards would be cool! Food products are cool too! I’d just like to be on everything!!!

Have you turned down any weird or wonderful things of you that companies wanted to make?
We are always turning things down if the company isn’t right for us. We were going to do a Roland Rat partwork once with a free tape in each issue which looked fab, but that was shelved in the end.

You are online a lot on Twitter and Facebook. Are you a fan?
I’m a big fan of both yeah, great way to talk to all my beloved Ratfans and get to know ‘em and tell everyone what I’m up to. It always amazes me how many Ratfans are out there.....I love you all yeahhhhh!

Thanks for talking to us Roland, and here’s to another 27 years!!
My pleasure and I send big hugs to all my Ratfans around the world & Ratfans.com. 

Luv ya ...

Rol 2010
xxx

Ratcave 2
Los Angeles

Ratfans.com would like to say a big thank you to Roland for taking time out of his busy schedule to conduct the interview.

© 2010 Roland Rat Superstar