Product Description

The inside story of the one of the most successful British stand-up comedians, as told by the person best qualified to reveal all about the man behind the comic, his wife of 10 years -- Pamela Stephenson. Whatever your opinion of Billy Connolly, his life has been an epic tale of controversy and hilarity, tragedy and comedy. From his working class roots in Glasgow he has worked his way to the top, and now enjoys huge worldwide acclaim and lives a dream lifestyle. From welding to folk singing to comedy to writing to acting, Billy has proved beyond doubt his versatility and sheer determination. And if anyone knows that better than him, it's his wife, Pamela, who will give us an insiders view of this hugely talented musician, singer, tv presenter, comdedian and actor. We will hear about the highs and the lows, the good times and the bad and she will take us behind-the-scenes of the films and tv shows he has been in and the sell-out tours that are so unmissable so that we get to see something of the real Billy Connolly.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #26841 in Books
• Published on: 2002-07-08
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Billy Connolly is loud, hilarious and contradictory. His biography, written by his wife, former comedian and practising psychotherapist Pamela Stephenson, is pretty much the same. Over the years Connolly has grown from Glasgow shipyard welder to folk-singing beardy hard man (yes there is such a thing) to darling of the good and great (or at least famous) around the world. That he is so many things to so many people while in no way compromising his core self can only be good. It would be no mean feat for Stephenson, then, to pen a history to that would satisfy Connolly audiences of fans and contemporaries from all periods of his life's journey. In most places, but in truth, not all, the author manages to do this well.

The first half of the biography is somewhat anthropological in tone. Not surprisingly, a post-war Glasgow upbringing is somewhat alien to the antipodean author and Stephenson errs towards Angela's Ashes intonation as she describes her husband's tenement childhood (Scots readers may also find her regular translation of seemingly self-explanatory Scots phrases--which Connolly would use--obtuse). In contrast her examination of her experience of living with the comedian and his life from that point on is much better. Anecdotes which Connolly uses in his live shows pepper the text and laughs are raised as he tells of the time he was mistaken as a drug dealer on Speyside, of his cheeky friendships with cinema's elite and even through the more difficult times; the difficulty of balancing an almost manic humour with a troubled life. Pages turn quickly as we grow to understand more of what makes the man tick.

Certainly fans of Billy Connolly will enjoy this book. It is not perfect but it is certainly entertaining and should fill a gap in the market until Billy--with his half-remembered stories and off-centre view of the world--decides to let us into his head as well as his history. There's surely one ideal way to do this and that's by writing his story himself. --Helen Lamont

Review
Pamela Stephenson, psychologist, former TV comic and wife of the superstar stand-up comedian/actor paints a revealing portrait of Billy Connolly whose life has been an epic tale of controversy and hilarity, tragedy and comedy. Nibbies 'Book of the Year'.

About the Author
An Australian born in New Zealand, Pamela Stephenson is famous for her starring role in'Not the Nine O'Clock News' and other TV and film work. She and Billy live and work in Los Angeles, where she now practises as a clinical psychologist.

Customer Reviews

Not the Connolly Biography
I grew up in the same Glasgow tenements as Billy Connolly, jumped the same dykes and scurried to the same outside toilets on a dark night. I bought his records in the 70s, his videos in the 90s and saw him once live. I'm a fan and glad he's doing well.

I approached this biography with an open mind - keen to learn more about a great entertainer and a bit of a hero of mine. I have to say, I was left feeling somewhat cheated.

The book is structured chronologically and each chapter deals with a sizeable chunk of the Big Yin's life. The chapters are titled with Connollyesque catch-phrases ("Cop yer whack!" etc.) but, most irritatingly, introduced by contemporary vignettes of Connolly's current lîfe. Since the book was published in late 2001, most of these are very recent and recount events like Hollywood parties and Connolly's Glasgow University graduation. For someone reading the book within months of publication they serve to highlight its freshness but as time rolls on, the effect will stagnate and, five years from now, they will make this book seem past its sell-by date.

Other reviewers have commented on the relentless name-dropping with which Stephenson peppers the text and it is in these chapter intros that the celebs crowd - Steve Martin, Robin Williams, Dustin Hoffman and so on. Seriously, how well do any of these people really know Billy Connelly? So is their opinion important to our understanding of the man? Or does Stephenson think that celebrity brings with it a gift of character judgement that lesser mortals lack?

In the earlier chapters, when recounting Connolly's childhood, apprenticeship and early career, the book is interesting. It was pleasing to read about Glasgow of the fifties and its whacky inhabitants and of Connolly's early involvement with folk music and his collaborations with, inter alia, Gerry Rafferty and Ralph McTell. Although there is one howler I must report: when describing a shipyard scene in 1962, Stephenson describes the workers as "tradespeople"... As much a PC-Pam may dislike it, it is a historical fact that every single human being working at a trade in a Glasgow Shipyard in the 60s was of the masculine persuasion and was never referred to as anything other than a tradesman.

The sections that deal with Connolly's troubled childhood - abandonment by his mother, mental and physical abuse by his aunt and sexual abuse by his father are revealing and I would not criticise Stephenson, as others have done, for commenting professionally on the effect these trauma have had on Connolly's mind. It was here, in fact, that I found her most illuminating.

As we read on into the mid-80s and our writer's fateful meeting with her subject, the focus begins to waver. Their early courtship seems to have inspired the script for "Notting Hill" with them dodging the media among flats and hotels in trendy London. From then on, we can never forget who he ended up with.

So what is missing from this book?

I was left wondering how much research had been done for this book and how much of it Stephenson had written off the top of her head. For a biography it is very thin on quotations and most of those are inconsequential flattery from mega-stars. What about Connolly's shipyard mates? His sister? Any old schoolpals? Iris, his ex-wife? Jamie and Cara, their children? The opinion of these vital personalities is absent or coloured by a third-person reportage after censoring by Stephenson.

I think she did speak to Gerry Rafferty, at least on the phone, and maybe Ralph McTell too. I did doubt even if Michael Parkinson was contacted - in fact, I had the uneasy feeling that he and Stephenson do not get on, such was the brevity with which she discussed his opinion on Connolly's drying out.

For a book about a comedian, jokes were thin on the ground too. There is a way to tell jokes on stage and Connolly has it; there is a way to tell jokes in a book and Stephenson does not have it.

When we turn to Connolly's film career, the narration tends to the hagiographic. Personally, I can remember Connolly starring in the excellent "Mrs. Brown" and in a handful of TV plays in the UK. Add in a couple of cameo appearances ("Indecent Proposal") and some American sitcoms and that's about it - a reasonable character actor. However, here Stephenson lists reams of movies which a film buff like me has never heard of and which turn out to have been critical and box-office flops. I'm sure Connolly is a good actor and I hope to see a lot more of him on the big screen in future (his appearance in the recent "Everlasting Piece" is superb) but some objectivity would have been prudent.

One final shot - where did she get the picture of Connolly for the cover? At a guess, I would date it to around 1985 which hardly concurs with the up-to-the minute breathlessness which pervades the rest of the book.

Seriously let down by his wife.
Billy Connolly has led an amazing life but the book fails to add the insight I was expecting from a therapist who knows him so intimately. I could have lived with this if the book had been funnier, but ended up ploughing my way through it in the belief that it just had to get better. It didn't. What a wasted opportunity.

An amazing story, poorly told
I found it a shame that the subject's own wife couldn't have done a better job of this. Yes, there is far too much gratuitous name-dropping in this book, and the sometimes muddled style of writing can make it confusing at first to keep track of the who's-who list of family members.

Many of the quotes and opinions used from the man himself appear to be taken from past television/public appearances (See the "Erect for 30 years" video for most of them) rather than from personal conversation. I could not help but feel that a great opportunity had been missed here.

The story which is being told, however, is what makes this book a very worthwhile read. Billy Connolly's unlikely life-journey is truly a triumph and an inspiration.