Frank Barrie, 1939 – 2025

British actor Frank Barrie, 86, died on June 30. Barrie played church-choir leader Edward Bishop on EastEnders in 2010-11, also turning up in such movies and TV shows as Emergency-Ward 10, The Main Chance, Softly Softly, Z Cars, John Keats: His Life and Death, Secret Army, Calendar Girls, and Doctors. Barrie was a member of the National Theatre Company at the Old Vic, playing lots and lots of Shakespeare, as well as the moderns; his one-man show Macready! played all over the world (but not on Astor Place!). Barrie told Abe J. Bassett that in his early years, “I had plenty of confidence and a certain amount of natural ability. My weaknesses were that I would be too solicitous of audience approval. I would do cheap things to get laughs and employ cheap techniques to get rounds of applause. There was a good deal of the coarse actor in me. On the other hand, of course, the audience loved it because I'm afraid the lowest common

denominator of an audience is always the easiest to tap. And I must have got away with it, even though it was in a quality theatre. I suppose in a way, I always advise very young actors to do this; you've got to make an impression, haven't you?”\