Blackadder II often hindered, by two less-than-intelligent sidekicks, his servant Baldrick (Tony Robinson), and Lord Percy Percy (Tim McInnerny), heir to the Duchy of Northumberland, with whom Blackadder has a grudging friendship. Throughout the series, Blackadder's chief rival is Lord Melchett (Stephen Fry), the Queen's pretentious and grovelling Lord Chamberlain. Melchett is himself in fear of upsetting the Queen, and thus attempts to outdo Blackadder by supporting the Queen in whatever current fad she is interested in. Comic relief in the Court is provided by the Queen's rather demented former nanny, Nursie (Patsy Byrne). Baldrick, who in the first series was the
Edmund Blackadder in which he was supposedly organising a birthday show for Charles II (also Fry). Edmund Blackadder, Esq., is the Blackadder appearing in the Regency period of British history. His family having fallen on hard times, he is reduced to a life of servitude, a fall made even more insufferable by his position as butler to the oafish and uncouth George, the Prince Regent. Despite this, he remains keenly intelligent (by far sharper than most of the people he associates with), and is usually found stealing from his employer. This is the only one of the main four incarnations not to