Christopher Rozycki 1943 – 2015

It is with great sadness that holby.tv has only just learnt that original CASUALTY cast member Christopher Rozycki died last year.

Christopher died following a fatal accidental fall on 10^th April 2015, leaving behind his wife, actress and agent Joanna Hole and four children.

Christopher Rozycki was an integral part of the first three series of the medical drama, playing Polish porter Kuba Trzcinski. He injected exuberant charm and comic relief into the show that was awash with hospital drama and politics.

Aside from being a comic character, Kuba was also intelligent and sensitive; in his debut episode Kuba was hailed a hero for identifying a toxic substance that had been spilled on some dock workers.

Christopher was born in October 1943 in Rospsza, a small village near Poland to parents Zigmund and Danusha. He attended the Lodz School of Film and Theatre and had a successful acting career in Poland before moving to the UK in the late 70’s. It was there he met his first wife, architect Maria Ficenes.

He got his first acting break in the UK, when he was spotted by a producer at a London Polish theatre who cast him as a Russian in ‘Sunset is Our Bible’, a play at the Oxford Festival.

In 1983, Christopher played the charming, entrepreneurial Russian trawlerman in the film ‘Local Hero’ despite knowing little English. He also appeared in the TV series ‘The Man from Moscow’ and the film ‘Deceptions’ before being cast as porter Kuba in ‘Casualty’.

After leaving the medical drama, Christopher starred in four episodes of TV series ‘Sleepers’ aswell as making appearances in a number of other TV shows including ‘Drop the Dead Donkey’, ‘French Cooking in Ten Minutes’, ‘Kavanagh QC’, ‘The Royal’, ‘The Saint’ and ‘The Bill’.

In 1991, Christopher featured in the film ‘Truly Madly Deeply’ starring Juliet Stevenson and the late Alan Rickman. One poignant scene saw his character, Titus, ask Nina (Stevenson) to go to Paris with him following the death of her boyfriend only to be turned down.

Marrying his second wife, Joanna Hole, in 1991; he had two further children, Sophie and Tom.

In the last 18 months, Christopher’s TV appearances were more frequential. He appeared in three episodes of popular ITV drama ‘Downton Abbey’ as Count Rostov aswell as TV series ‘Stella’ and film ‘The Honourable Rebel’.

His last acting credit was in the BBC Radio 4 play ‘Now Love’ alongside actress Sorcha Cusack.

holby.tv sends out belated but sincere condolences to Christopher’s family. He will be greatly missed by us all.

Remembering Christopher in Casualty…