to the sketch and, further maintaining the myth, told him to reject Wiley's 'request' for £3,000 as too expensive, before giving Corbett the sketch for free. Speculation began about Wiley's identity, with Tom Stoppard, Frank Muir, Alan Bennett and Noël Coward all rumoured. After the second series of Frost on Sunday, the cast and crew were invited to a Chinese restaurant, while Wiley said that he would reveal himself. Barker, who had told Corbett earlier in the day, stood up and announced he was Wiley, although initially nobody believed him. In 1969, Barker was able to write, produce and star as Sir Giles Futtock in the film Futtock's End which featured little dialogue and only "grumble[s] and grunt[s]". The Ronnie Barker Playhouse had been designed to find a successful idea for a sitcom, and the episode "Ah, There You Are" by Alun Owen, which introduced the bumbling aristocratic character Lord Rustless, was chosen. The character returned for the 1969–1970 series Hark at Barker as the main character; Barker wrote for the show under the name Jonathan Cobbald. As Wiley he wrote the 1971 series Six Dates with Barker. Despite Barker's success on ITV, LWT's programme controller Stella Richman opted to fire Frost's company Paradine (Frost was sacked from the LWT board) and as Barker was contracted to the company rather than the network, he lost his job, as did Corbett. Move to the BBC and The Two Ronnies Soon after, Barker, Corbett and Josephine Tewson performed a sketch about Henry VIII at the 1971 BAFTAs, with Barker playing Henry. The three also had to keep the audience entertained for eight or so minutes as the show was stopped because of technical difficulties. Their performance at the award show impressed the BBC's Head of Light Entertainment Bill Cotton and Controller of BBC1, Paul Fox, who were sitting in the audience. Not knowing they were both essentially unemployed, although still contracted to Paradine, Cotton signed the duo up for their own show together, and a series each on their own; he later joked he "must have offered them too much money." Barker and Corbett wished to avoid being remembered primarily as a duo, and felt they could not work in the same way as a conventional double act like Morecambe and Wise, and so each maintained their solo careers as well. They each were given a one-off variety special; Barker's, called The