Arkwright (Open All Hours) into a joke, for example asking: "Granville, how do you spell P-p-p-pepper? Is it 6 Ps or 7?" Granville occasionally mocks his uncle's speech pattern (such as calling the "weather fore-fore-forecast" the "weather twelvecast", and referring to the "B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-BC" as morse code), although never in a malicious or hurtful manner. Arkwright was shocked on one occasion to find that he also appears to stutter even when thinking to himself. By the time of the 2013 episode "Still Open All Hours" and the sequel series of the same name, Arkwright has long since died (Barker died in 2005), but almost all
Ronnie Barker aired posthumously in December. Barker became a comic actor in his theatre days, noting "I think it's better to make people laugh than cry." He has been described by "The Times" as "not a comedian, [but] an actor with a talent for comedy," who "slipped into characters with apparent ease." Barker felt he was funny only in character. The BBC wrote of him: "Able to deliver the great tongue-twisting speeches required of his characters, Barker pronounced himself 'completely boring' without a script." Peter Hall spoke of Barker's skills as a dramatic actor, calling him "the great actor we lost" and