Headmaster Barnes

Headmaster Barnes presides over Truham Grammar with the mild, faintly absent-minded authority of a man who has given a thousand assemblies. He appears at the edges of school life—announcements, prize-givings, the occasional stern word—more institution than individual, keeping order over the boys without ever quite stepping into their stories.

Stephen Fry brings his familiar warm boom to a role that barely needs an actor of his stature, and that's the joke and the pleasure of it—a beloved voice slipped into a small, proper English schoolmaster part, adding unexpected polish to scenes that could otherwise pass without notice.