Stephen Fry is having a moment right now as he’s just appeared in perhaps the two biggest LGBTQ+ streaming releases of the month of August. First, he reprised his small but entertaining role as the unseen voice of the principal of Truham Boys Grammar School in Netflix’s smash-hit second season of Heartstopper and then he played King James III in Prime Video’s romcom Red, White & Royal Blue. A casting that’s ironic, as Fry is close friends with King Charles III in real life.
Yes, as that bit of trivia suggests, Stephen Fry is something of a national institution in the United Kingdom, as well as a famous face across the Atlantic and overseas as well, with his career on TV and film screens going back four decades at this point. Openly gay throughout his career, as well as being transparent about his experience with bipolar disorder, Fry has also long been a celebrated advocate for the LGBTQ+ community and for campaigning to raise awareness for mental health.
Fry’s career has rarely slowed down, as his recent dual roles show, but here are his very best movie and TV projects.
Blackadder (1983-89)
One of the most perennially popular sitcoms in the U.K., historical comedy series Blackadder helped launch the careers of many of its talented cast and crew, including co-creator Richard Curtis (Love Actually), star Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean), and, yes, Stephen Fry. The unique series is set in a different period of British history each season, with the same cast recurring throughout in different roles. Fry was a fixture in all seasons bar the first, but his best performance is undoubtedly as idiotic WW1 officer General Melchett in Blackadder Goes Forth.
Jeeves & Wooster (1990-93)
Long before he was House, Hugh Laurie was best known in the U.K. for serving as one half of a long-running comedy double act with Stephen Fry — the pair met at university when introduced by their mutual pal, Emma Thompson. Their first TV show together was sketch show A Bit of Fry and Laurie (1989-1995), but they also got to act opposite each other in Jeeves & Wooster, the definitive adaptation of P.G. Wodehouse’s comedy novels about dim 1920s socialite Bertie Wooster (Laurie) and his intelligent valet, Jeeves (Fry).
Wilde (1997)
As will become obvious as this run through Fry’s career continues, the actor typically plays supporting roles in movies rather than the protagonist, but Fry marked himself out as a gifted leading man in 1997’s Wilde, a biopic about celebrated Victorian writer Oscar Wilde, who was famously imprisoned for being homosexual. Not only does Fry look uncannily like the real historical figure, he captures Wilde’s flamboyant personality, endless wit, and ultimate tragedy in a pitch-perfect performance that earned him a Golden Globe nomination.
Gosford Park (2001)
Gosford Park is easily the most highly decorated entry in Fry’s filmography when it comes to Academy Award accolades. As directed by Robert Altman from a script by future Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, Gosford Park is a classic Agatha Christie-style whodunnit — concerning a murder occurring during a dinner party at an English country house — that might not break the mold but is exceedingly well done and is enlivened by an A-list ensemble cast of familiar British actors, with Fry joined by Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Charles Dance, and many more.
V for Vendetta (2005)
Perhaps surprisingly, Stephen Fry has yet to wander into a Marvel or mainstream DC movie, but he does have a comic book film under his belt thanks to 2005’s V for Vendetta, the seminal dystopian story from Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. Fry serves the important supporting role of Gordon Deitrich, a TV host and friend of Natalie Portman’s Evey who is inspired to stand up against the regime by V’s freedom fighting. Fry brings Gordon’s good humor in the face of adversity and brutal ending to heart-breaking life.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005)
Fry and beloved sci-fi author Douglas Adams were good friends — fun fact: the duo were the very first two people in Europe to own Apple Macs in the 1980s — so there was really no one else capable of providing the narration to the 2005 movie adaptation of his much-missed friend’s best-selling novel. In The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Fry features throughout as the voice of the titular cosmic book that allows Martin Freeman’s Arthur Dent to navigate the weird and wonderful universe beyond the Earth.
Alice in Wonderland (2010)
Tim Burton has spoken about how he wanted to recapture how much the original Disney animation disturbed him as a child with his Alice in Wonderland remake, and by golly, did he achieve that when it came to the depiction of Cheshire Cat. The teeth-flashing feline has always been a kooky character, but 2010’s Cheshire is deeply disconcerting, as brilliantly brought to life by some lively CGI and Stephen Fry’s sly, sonorous vocal performance. He reprised the role in 2014’s Alice Through the Looking Glass.
Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)
Stephen Fry is a big Sherlock Holmes fan — he once narrated all 60 original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on audio — so he was perfect casting to play the Great Detective’s big brother in Guy Ritchie’s sequel to his smash-hit blockbuster reimagining of the super-sleuth’s mythos. In Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Fry plays Mycroft, older sibling to Robert Downey Jr.’s “Sherly.” The role got the most out of Fry’s copious comic talents, with Mycroft portrayed as something of an absent-minded — and nudist! — genius.
The Hobbit movies (2013-14)
Although Fry has bizarrely never translated his Harry Potter audiobook connections to a role in the movie franchise, he did instead hop over to another legendary fantasy universe when he starred in two thirds of The Hobbit trilogy. Fry played the important role of the Master of Lake-town, a major location in parts two and three, The Desolation of Smaug and The Battle of the Five Armies, of Peter Jackson’s ambitious if bloated follow-up to his original Lord of the Rings trilogy.
It’s a Sin (2021)
I almost included Hulu’s The Dropout as the final item on this list, but although Fry’s performance in the Elizabeth Holmes bio-drama is extremely emotional, It’s a Sin just beats it to the case. It’s probably fair to call It’s a Sin one of the most important TV shows of the decade so far as this dramatization of the AIDs crisis in the U.K. resulted in a huge upsurge of HIV testing in the weeks after its release — so powerful was this joyous, funny yet gut-wrenching and heart-shattering tale about a group of gay men and their friends living in London in the late ’80s, in which Fry plays a closeted gay MP.
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