Born in a poor tenement block, Connolly was abandoned by his mother, Mamie, at the age of three and brought up by his aunt, Mona, who used to beat him, and his father, William, who sexually abused him - a background explored in his 2001 biography Billy.

As a teenager, he joined the Clyde shipyards, where he served his apprenticeship as a welder. While working there, he bought a banjo for £2 10s after seeing blues singer Pete Seger on the TV, and started performing on Scotland's folk circuit as part of a band called the Humblebums, which counted Gerry Rafferty among its members.

While performing, Connolly noticed that audiences warmed to the banter between his songs, which built up his confidence. In 1970, the band split up and he started performing solo.

Also during his time at the shipyards, he met his first wife, Iris, with whom he had a son and a daughter.

His big break was on the Parkinson show in 1975, which made him a star and led to his first UK tour: The Big Wee Tour.

He spent many years on the road, the lifestyle taking its toll, and he became a heavy drinker, until he gave up alcohol in 1986.

His reputation grew and grew, and he eventually moved to California to try to break into the US, with varying degrees of success.

In 1989, he married Pamela Stephenson, who he met while recording a sketch for Not The Nine O'Clock News.

CV

Billy Connolly: Hammersmith Apollo January 2010
Live Review
Hammersmith Apollo

Billy Connolly has been British comedy’s elder statesman since before the newest of stand-ups were born, so it’s inevitable to ask whether, at 67, he’s ‘still go it’.

The answer is a certain ‘yes’ – with only a very few qualifications.

Age does appear to have affected his short-term memory, with Connolly losing his thread in pretty much every story. But after cursing to himself, he always manages to pick up the train of thought… as well as the occasional story from earlier in the show you’d long assumed he’d abandoned.

It’s all part of his effortless charm, of course. Connolly pioneered the naturalistic form of conversational comedy that still rules today, and the more white he gets in his scraggly mane, the more he fits the persona of the lively, opinionated bar-room ‘character’ dispensing anecdotes and good company.

‘We’re just having a wee conversation,’ he tells the Hammersmith Apollo crowd. ‘But you don’t get to say anything. It’s like talking to your mother…’

Until he hits his stride, the early part of the show is pretty much angry invective, but not much wit, as he rails against his chosen hate-figures with little more than his welder’s vocabulary. It’s all very well calling people ‘wankers’ but it doesn’t take that much skill.

Swearing, though, remains his forte… with only fellow Glaswegian Peter Capaldi’s Thick Of It spin doctor outdoing him in the four-letter stakes. The undoubted highlight of this show is a brilliant routine on the etiquette of dropping the C-bomb, with Connolly finding special delight in its most casual deployment – while berating the Americans for getting it all wrong.

For whatever his chronological age and the trappings of stardom, the Big Yin remains a cheeky 12-year-old at heart, delighting in saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. He’s the sort of man who likes to surreptitiously get his willy out at a twee civic buffet, as he describes in another hilarious routine, while staying playful rather than crude. That seems to be his credo.

Though he’s long sworn off the booze, saloon-bar yarns are never far from the agenda. He has a great running gag about the jelly-legged drunks of Edinburgh’s pub-lined Rose Street, but every story, you feel, should be regaled from a bar stool. True to that spirit, there are a couple of ‘pub gags’ in here, often attributed, accurately or not, to other larger-than life characters such as Jimmy Nail and Frank Carsons.

The use of such second-hand material – as well as the likes of T-shirt slogans – might be frowned upon by purists, but it all forms part of his patchwork of patter. And if you want a tall tale to be told well, get Connolly to tell it – you couldn’t ask for anyone more instinctively funny and irresistibly personable. Even his habit of doubling over in laughter at his own impending hilarity, though initially irritating, is soon forgiven.

And when the ‘grumpy old man’ fury returns for a second attack on politicians – especially David Cameron – he’s found some barbed comments to match the passion, properly skewering the smarmy old Etonian.

At two interval-free hours, this was shorter that some of Connolly earlier bladder-troubling shows – and is all the better for the brevity. It proves that even when distracted, the godfather of modern comedy is a raconteur of considerable standing.

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Saw him last Saturday at the Apollo and I have to say the gig was the worst I've seen in years (and I've seen dozens of stand-ups in the last year alone). The advertised 2.5 hours turned out to be nearer 1 hour 50, but in the end that was a blessing. He either didn't bother to prepare (why would you bother if you can sell out venues and live-off your former glory?) or he's losing his marbles because he re-used vast amounts of material, constantly went-off at tangents and he seemed incapable of coming-back to stories to finish them off. Some of his material deserved to rest in peace in the 1970s when it was written and simply isn't funny in 2010. The funniest thing was a one-liner about a hole in a flower pot. Sadly it was all very lame.

Malc, January 2010

He just finished his UK tour, but he skipped Ireland and not for the first time. It's a real slap in the face to all his fans in Ireland, a place he's always talked about with fondness before. He's played Australia, America, Canada, and the UK, surely a few dates over here wasn't going to harm him in any way?I just want to know if he's ever going to play here again or not, I don't want to waste my time checking his website to see he's changed his mind. Pissed-off Connolly Fan.

Robert Pidgeon, November 2007

Saw the Big Yin live once - almost wet myself with laughter. He has a knack of taking the normal everyday things in life and finding a funny side. This comedian is a must see, must hear, must meet guy. I will never look at Scotland again without a smile on my face.

Mark Jordan, October 2007

I can honestly say I've never laughed so hard. At several points the whole audience was gagging for air. Still on top form. I suspect many of those who trash him haven't even seen him live.

Charles Thomson, October 2007

Saw Billy at the Hammersmith Apollo, and he's far from lost it. I personally thought he was consistently brilliant for the full three hours. OK, so the Ken Bigley comments were a tad misjudged, but if some unknown comic said the same things in a students' union bar, no bugger would bat an eyelid. Connolly's delivery and material still exceeds much of the dross peddled by newer comedians.

Richard Bailey, October 2004

I suggest that is is the media who are seeking sensation and hence profit on the back of another countryman's desperate suffering. Billy's shows had already sold out completely before he even made those comments, so he was gaining nothing, simply voicing an opinion. If you're looking for the real cowards, turn to the media, not Billy Connolly.

Sandra, October 2004

Obviously he's a legend, but that dosen't mean he can't f**k up now and again. Silly old bugger, absolutley no need to mention the Thai bride...

Hamish, October 2004

The Big Yin ... the Big Git ... The BIGgot ... the Big Shit ... would be more like it. His ego and his arrogance have let him forget his own humble beginnings. At least his yellow banana boots mirror the colour of his backbone; what an insensitive coward the man is, seeking sensation and hence profit on the back of another countryman's desperate suffering.

Stephen Taylor, October 2004

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