Ronald William George Barker (25 September 1929 – 3 October 2005) was an English actor, comedian and writer. He was known for roles in British comedy television series such as The Frost Report, The Two Ronnies, Porridge, and Open All Hours.
Barker began acting in Oxford amateur dramatics while working as a bank clerk, having dropped out of higher education. He moved into repertory theatre with the Aylesbury Repertory Company and decided he was best suited to comic roles. He had his first success at the Oxford Playhouse and in roles in the West End including Tom Stoppard's The Real Inspector Hound. During this period, he was in the cast of several BBC radio and television comedies, most notably the radio sitcom The Navy Lark. He got his television break with David Frost's satirical sketch series The Frost Report (1966–67), where he worked with John Cleese and Ronnie Corbett, the latter becoming Barker's long-time comedy partner. He joined Frost's production company and starred in several ITV shows during the late 1960s.
After rejoining the BBC in the early 1970s, Barker and Corbett achieved significant success with the sketch show The Two Ronnies (1971–87). The duo maintained their careers as solo performers; Barker notably starred as inmate Norman Stanley Fletcher in the sitcom Porridge (1974–77) and its sequel Going Straight (1978) and as shopkeeper Arkwright in the sitcom Open All Hours (1976–85). He wrote comedy under his own name, though for much of his written material after 1968 he adopted pseudonyms (including "Gerald Wiley") to avoid pre-judgment of his writing talent. He won a BAFTA for best light entertainment performance four times, among other awards, and was appointed an OBE in 1978.
Barker's later sitcoms such as The Magnificent Evans (1984) and Clarence (1988) were less successful and he retired in December 1987. The following year, he opened an antiques shop with his wife, Joy. After 1999, he appeared in smaller, non-comic roles in films. He died of heart failure on 3 October 2005, aged 76.
Early life
Barker was born on 25 September 1929 at 70 Garfield Street, Bedford, the only son of Leonard William Barker (always known as "Tim") and Edith Eleanor (née Carter; known as "Sis", by virtue of being the youngest sister amongst her siblings).
Barker's elder sister Vera was born in 1926 and his younger sister Eileen was born in 1933. His father was a clerk for Shell-Mex, and this job saw the family move to Church Cowley Road in Cowley, Oxfordshire, when Barker was four.
Barker's biographer Bob McCabe described Barker's childhood as "a happy time, marred by no ructions or family tensions, apart from the occasional wet sock." As a child, Barker enjoyed dressing up, particularly in his father's pierrot outfit, as well as films, comics and animals. He developed a love of the theatre, often attending plays with his family. The first play he saw was Cottage to Let and he once skipped school to see Laurence Olivier in Henry V. He frequently stood outside stage doors to collect autographs, his first being the actress Celia Johnson.
Barker grew up in the Florence Park area of Oxford, and went to Donnington Junior School, and then the City of Oxford High School for Boys. His chemistry textbook at Oxford had previously been used by T. E. Lawrence. He found his talent for humour at school and developed his musical ability by singing in the choir at St James's, his local church. He got into the sixth form a year early after gaining the School Certificate but he felt what he was learning would be of no use to him in later life and so left as soon as he could.
After leaving school, he trained as an architect; however, feeling he was not skilled enough, he quit after six months. Barker took his sister Vera's job as a bank clerk at the Westminster Bank after she had left to become a nurse. He harboured dreams of becoming an actor, and took up amateur dramatics, although initially he just saw the pastime as a chance to meet girls.
For 18 months, while at the bank, he worked as an actor and stage manager, making his first appearance in A Murder Has Been Arranged as the musical director of the play-within-a-play. Eventually he gave up his job to become a professional actor. His father did not support his acting ambition.
Theatrical career
Barker failed to get into the Young Vic School, but joined the Aylesbury Repertory Company, which was based in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, often taking comic roles in their weekly shows. Initially he was employed as the assistant to the assistant stage manager, earning £2.10s. 0d (£2.50) a week. He made his debut as a professional actor on 15 November 1948 as Lieutenant Spicer in a performance of J. M. Barrie's Quality Street. He went on to play the organist in When We Are Married and by his third role, the chauffeur Charles in Miranda, Barker realised he wanted to be a comic actor. He was described as "ha[ving] the talent to be a great straight actor", but noted: "I want to make people laugh. Never mind about Hamlet. Forget Richard the Second. Give me Charley's Aunt. My mission in life was now crystal clear." He appeared in stage adaptations of Treasure Island and Red Riding Hood before getting his first leading role in The Guinea Pig as a working-class boy at a public school. When the production moved to Rhyl, Barker followed. The Aylesbury Repertory Company closed, as did the Rhyl company shortly after.
Barker, aged 20, then spent some time as a porter at Wingfield Hospital; he became distressed through his contact with polio patients and so opted to take on the persona of "Charlie" so as not to be himself. He and a male nurse often entertained the patients with comedy routines. He found work at the Mime Theatre Company, performing mimed folk music and dance, which soon folded in Penzance. He made his way back to Oxford and then worked in Bramhall for the Famous Players. There he met actor Glenn Melvyn; the two became firm friends and Barker stated Melvyn taught him everything he "ever learned about comedy".
Barker joined the Oxford Playhouse in 1951 and worked there for three years, appearing in plays such as He Who Gets Slapped as Polly. Peter Hall worked with Barker at Oxford and gave him his break, casting him as the Chantyman and Joe Silva in his production of Mourning Becomes Electra at the Arts Theatre in London's West End in 1955. By the time he had made it to the West End, Barker had appeared in an estimated 350 plays.
Barker remained a West End actor for several years, appearing in numerous plays between 1955 and 1968. These included, in 1955, two performances each night as he played a gypsy in Listen to the Wind at the Arts Theatre and then a peasant in Summertime later in the evening. His other roles included Mr. Thwaites in Double Image in 1956 (with Olivier), Camino Real (directed by Hall) in 1957, French gangster Robertoles-Diams in Irma La Douce for two years from 1958, Lord Slingsby-Craddock in Mr. Whatnot in 1964 and Birdboot in The Real Inspector Hound in 1968. He also appeared in several Royal Court Theatre productions, including A Midsummer Night's Dream as Quince.
Early media career
Barker's theatrical success enabled him to move into radio work. Barker, who had previously been known by his full name "Ronald", was now referred to as the less formal form "Ronnie", after a director changed it in the credits, although he did not tell Barker. His first radio appearance was in 1956, playing Lord Russett in Floggit's. He went on to play multiple characters, but primarily the put-upon Able Seaman "Fatso" Johnson and Lieutenant-Commander Stanton in The Navy Lark, a navy based sitcom on the BBC Light Programme, which ran from 1959 to 1977, with Barker featuring in some 300 episodes.
Barker also featured in the show's radio spin-off The TV Lark, in which his character, Fatso, was now a camera operator after the main characters were drummed out of the service, and as a trainee chef in…