New Zealanders Convinced Stephen Fry Must Be Some Other Articulate Bloke Off The Telly

A typical Kiwi struggling to say 'Go home'

Whilst in New Zealand for the filming of The Hobbit, British national treasure Stephen Fry complains of constantly being mistaken for any other television personality capable of enunciating all five vowels.

“No matter how devilishly I secrete myself within the scenic magnificence of this linguistically-challenged backwater, up pops some ruddy-faced sheepshearer, invariably jabbing a grubby finger in my face and making, ‘Ir, ir yi Jims Miy? Ir yi Jirmi Clrxn?’ noises,” groaned the lugubrious polymath. “To which I am naturally compelled to reply – and in doing so, if I may venture so presumptuously, with almost Wildean jocosity - ‘Oh, I am sorry. Would you by any chance happen to be terribly afflicted with lockjaw, my fine jolly swain, or is your unfortunate impediment caused by some sort of diet-related wiring?’”

“That’s usually when they hit me,” he added ruefully from his hospital bed.

Mr Fry’s ongoing attempts to write a script for Peter Jackson’s long-delayed ‘Dambusters’ remake, meanwhile, have met with frustration as he struggles in vain to find a New Zealand actor who can pronounce Eder, Möhne or Sorpe without dislocating their face.