The persona adopted by the writers for Horne was not greatly different from his real-life one, and largely the same as that of his "Beyond Our Ken" character: the urbane, unflappable, tolerant but sometimes surprised central figure, around whom the other characters revolved. "The Times" called Horne the "master of the scandalous double-meaning delivered with shining innocence", and in "Round the Horne" he combined the role of straight man to the flamboyant Julian and Sandy, Rambling Syd Rumpo and J.Peasmold Gruntfuttock with that of genial host of the show. Feldman called him "the best straight man I had ever seen", who nonetheless had "a lot of funny lines"; Jonathan Rigby, who played Horne in a stage show, "Round the Horne ... Revisited", thought him "a stand-up comedian with a posh accent ... part of his genius was that he was able to be himself".