Miranda Richardson she prefers new work rather than the classics because of the history which goes with them. In 1985, Richardson made her film debut as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in the United Kingdom, in the biographical drama "Dance with a Stranger". Around the same time, Richardson played a comedic Queen Elizabeth I, aka Queenie, in the British television comedy "Blackadder II". Following "Dance with a Stranger", Richardson turned down numerous parts in which her character was unstable or disreputable, including the Glenn Close role in "Fatal Attraction". In this period, she appeared in "Empire of the Sun"
Blackadder II the previous series, as the puritanical Lady Whiteadder in "Beer"; and Stephen Fry's comedy partner Hugh Laurie, who appears twice, first as the drunken Simon Partridge in "Beer" and in the final episode as the evil Prince Ludwig. Laurie was later given a larger role as George in the next two series. Also Bob, played by Gabrielle Glaister, a former classmate of Ben Elton's, made her first appearance. Several of the characters were seen in similar guises in later series. The opening titles are accompanied by a mock-Elizabethan arrangement of Howard Goodall's "Blackadder" theme played on a recorder and an