50 Fun Facts About Blackadder

Who played Blackadder's servant Baldrick in every series and special?

Robinson is the only actor besides Atkinson to appear in all four series and every special. He was knighted in 2013 for services to drama and charity.

Blackadder Goes Forth is set in the trenches of which conflict?

The action is set in 1917 on the Western Front, with the ever-planned 'big push' hanging over every episode.

Which catchphrase is Baldrick best known for?

The line first appears in the unaired 1982 pilot but was not used regularly until the third series.

Which root vegetable is Baldrick obsessed with?

The Regency Baldrick spends the £400,000 he receives as a Lord on one enormous specimen, which Blackadder promptly crushes on his head.

Who played the buffoonish Prince Regent in Blackadder the Third?

Laurie had already appeared twice in Blackadder II, as the drunken Simon Partridge and as Prince Ludwig the Indestructible.

Which actor played Melchett in Blackadder II and Blackadder Goes Forth?

Fry also turned up as the Duke of Wellington in the final episode of Blackadder the Third and as the doomed king in The Cavalier Years.

Who played Queenie, the childish Tudor monarch of Blackadder II?

Richardson later returned in one-off roles as the highwayman Amy Hardwood and as Nurse Mary Fletcher-Brown.

In which year is The Black Adder, the first series, set?

The premise is a secret history in which Bosworth was won by Richard III, and everything is quietly covered up by Henry Tudor afterwards.

Blackadder II is set during the reign of which English monarch?

The writers reportedly picked the Elizabethan setting because it was 'a sexy age that the kids can relate to'.

What is the first name of Blackadder's nemesis, Captain Darling?

McInnerny had played the dim Lord Percy in the first two series before returning as Darling, Blackadder's equal in rank and rival in everything else.

What is the title of the final episode of Blackadder Goes Forth?

The title was a period song; the first five episodes of the series were puns pairing a military rank with another word.

The episode titles of Blackadder the Third are puns on the novels of which author?

Hence 'Dish and Dishonesty', 'Ink and Incapability' and 'Duel and Duality'; the fifth episode was originally billed as 'Cape and Capability'.

Rik Mayall played which vulgar, swaggering friend-turned-rival of Blackadder?

Mayall also played Mad Gerald in the first series and a distinctly Flashheart-like Robin Hood in Back & Forth.

Blackadder II was the first series to feature which writer alongside Curtis?

A chance meeting led to the collaboration; the new co-writer also worked as the studio warm-up comic before recordings.

Who produced all four Blackadder series?

Lloyd, who went on to create QI, later suggested a Batman parody called 'Batadder' as a possible fifth series.

Who composed the Blackadder theme tune, rearranged in period style for each series?

It is played with trumpets and timpani for the medieval series, on recorder and electric guitar for the Tudor one, and as a harpsichord minuet for the Regency.

In Blackadder's Christmas Carol, what kind of shop does Ebenezer Blackadder run?

He starts the special as the kindest man in England and ends it having concluded that 'bad guys have all the fun'.

Who played the Spirit of Christmas in Blackadder's Christmas Carol?

The Spirit's visions of ruthless ancestors backfire completely: Ebenezer admires them and decides to follow suit.

In 'Corporal Punishment', what was Melchett's pet pigeon, shot by Blackadder, called?

The plot nods to the capital sentences carried out under military law during the war.

Where was Blackadder: Back & Forth originally shown in 1999?

With a budget of around £3 million, it was the only outing after the first series to return to location shooting.

Which supermodel cameoed as Maid Marian in Blackadder: Back & Forth?

Colin Firth's cameo as Shakespeare ends with Blackadder punching him on behalf of every schoolchild forced to study him.

In the 2004 BBC poll for Britain's Best Sitcom, Blackadder finished second behind which show?

Blackadder polled 282,106 votes with broadcaster John Sergeant championing its cause.

How far from the front is General Melchett's château, by Blackadder's reckoning?

When Melchett promises Baldrick that he and Darling are 'behind you', Blackadder adds: 'About 35 miles behind you.'

In Blackadder the Third, Baldrick speculates that his first name might be what?

A diplomatic Blackadder records him as 'S. Baldrick', an initial his descendants appear to have kept.

In the trenches, Private Baldrick makes coffee from which unlikely ingredient?

The rat-cooking and mud-coffee are among the ways the series details the privations of trench life alongside the jokes.

What tactic does General Melchett propose because 'it'll be the last thing Fritz will expect'?

The line skewers the 'lions led by donkeys' view of the war's generals, a portrayal some historians later criticised as unfair.

In 'Dish and Dishonesty', Baldrick stands as a candidate in what kind of contest?

Real political commentator Vincent Hanna covered the count, billed as 'his own great-great-great grandfather'.

Who narrated all six episodes of The Black Adder?

The first series ended its credits with the line 'Additional Dialogue by William Shakespeare'.

Which comedian played the king whom Edmund unwittingly beheads after Bosworth in the first series?

Edmund thinks the king is stealing his horse and takes his head off, then arrives late to the battle and claims to have killed 450 peasants.

Brian Blessed played Edmund's father, who reigns under which regnal name?

The real Richard, Duke of York, was one of the Princes in the Tower and about twelve at Bosworth, hardly old enough for two grown sons.

In which year did Blackadder Goes Forth win the BAFTA for Best Comedy Series?

Rowan Atkinson also won Best Light Entertainment Performance for his Captain Blackadder.

In the 1988 English Civil War Comic Relief special, Blackadder and Baldrick are the last men loyal to which king?

Baldrick's plan to save the king involves swapping his head for a pumpkin. It does not go well.

Who played Oliver Cromwell in Blackadder: The Cavalier Years?

The 15-minute episode is set in November 1648, in the last days of the war.

Much of the location filming for the first series took place at which Northumberland castle?

The first series cost about a million pounds for six episodes, which is why the BBC demanded drastic cuts before commissioning a second.

In the unaired 1982 pilot, who played Baldrick?

The pilot's Prince Edmund is much closer to the cunning Blackadder of later series than the snivelling buffoon of series one.

In which year was the 1982 pilot finally broadcast on television in full?

The same year Royal Mail issued a set of Blackadder stamps and Demon Records released the soundtracks on a 12-LP gold vinyl box set.

In early scripts, what was Captain Darling's surname before it was changed?

Curtis was initially reluctant to make the change because he thought it was a one-off joke.

Baldrick's love of turnips reportedly arose because a writer confused them with which 'amusingly shaped' vegetable?

The 'Beer' episode still delivers the payoff, with Baldrick and Percy discovering a specimen shaped like a 'thingy'.

The dogfight footage in 'Private Plane' was re-edited from which 1976 war film?

Other than the title sequence, the series used almost no exterior shooting at all.

Blackadder Goes Forth was among the first British programmes transmitted in stereo using which system?

Most viewers heard it in mono anyway, on the standard FM carrier.

'Redadder', an unmade series idea Atkinson described in 2017, would have been set in which country?

Rik Mayall, unsurprisingly, was to have played Rasputin. Other floated ideas included 'Batadder' and a space-set 'Star Adder'.

In Back & Forth, what causes the extinction of the dinosaurs?

The time machine works because Baldrick built it from Leonardo da Vinci's plans, though he forgot to write dates on the dials.

In Blackadder's Christmas Carol, what title were the two strangers he throws out planning to give him?

The strangers were Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, played by Miriam Margolyes and Jim Broadbent.

Blackadder's fierce swordsman cousin MacAdder, also played by Atkinson, comes from which country?

It leads to a scene of Atkinson acting opposite himself, and ends with Blackadder permanently swapping places with the Prince Regent.

Which dictionary-writer's manuscript does Baldrick burn in 'Ink and Incapability'?

The real Johnson died in 1784 and his dictionary was published in 1755, decades before any formal Regency, which the show cheerfully ignores.

Which field marshal sweeps toy soldiers into a bin during a phone call in the final episode of Goes Forth?

Geoffrey Palmer played the part; Blackadder elsewhere describes Haig's advances as attempts to move his drinks cabinet six inches closer to Berlin.

Adrian Edmondson guest-starred in Goes Forth as which real German flying ace?

Edmondson and Palmer are the only two guest actors in the series playing fictionalised versions of real historical figures.

Blackadder II's opening titles parody the credits of which 1976 BBC drama?

The titles feature a live black snake slithering on a marble table until it is swapped for an object matching the episode's one-word title.

Which of these was NOT one of Miriam Margolyes's three guest roles across the Blackadder canon?

Nursie, the Queen's demented former nanny, was played by Patsy Byrne in every episode of Blackadder II.

Who played Mrs. Miggins, the coffee-shop proprietress of Blackadder the Third?

That Regency series also featured Robbie Coltrane as Dr. Samuel Johnson and Tim McInnerny as the Scarlet Pimpernel.