![]() ![]() The Manchester Repertory Company closed, as did the Rhyl company shortly after. When the production moved to Rhyl, Barker followed. My mission in life was now crystal clear." He appeared in stages 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. He was described as "ha the talent to be a great straight actor", but noted: "I want to make people laugh. 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 made his debut as a professional actor on Novemas Lieutenant Spicer in a performance of J. Initially he was employed as the assistant to the assistant stage manager, earning £2.10 a week. His father was not supportive of his acting ambition.īarker failed to get into the Young Vic School, but joined the Manchester Repertory Company, which was based in Aylesbury, often taking comic roles in their weekly shows. Eventually he gave up his job to become a professional actor. He worked in amateur dramatics for eighteen months while at the bank, 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. Barker harboured dreams of becoming an actor. Barker took his sister Vera's job as a bank clerk at the Westminster Bank (after she had left to become a nurse). After leaving school he trained as an architect but gave it up after six months, as he felt he was not skilled enough. He got in to the sixth form a year early but felt what he was learning would be of no use to him in later life and so left as soon as he could. He found his talent for humour at school and developed his musical ability by singing in the choir at St James church. Barker attended the City of Oxford High School for Boys. The first play he saw was Cottage to Let and he once skipped school in order to see Laurence Olivier in Henry V he frequently stood outside the stage-door to collect autographs, his first being the actress Celia Johnson. The family moved to Cowley, Oxfordshire when Barker was four.Īs a child, Barker enjoyed dressing up, and developed a love of the theatre, often attending plays with his family. ![]() He had two sisters one older, Vera and one younger, Eileen. ![]() Barker was born Ronald William George Barker on 25 September 1929 in Bedford, Bedfordshire, England to Leonard and Edith Barker. ![]()
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