In February 2004, he was voted Britain's most admired contemporary columnist by the British Journalism Review. Yorkshire Film Archive is a charity registered in England and Wales (1093468) and a company limited by guarantee registered in England and Wales (04480153) Not sure how objective I can be about a book I read and loved at just the right age to see a lot of myself in the protagonist.

Billy Liar by Keith Waterhouse, First Edition - AbeBooks Billy Liar by Keith Waterhouse, First Edition - AbeBooks

The film is one of many made in Yorkshire (see the book Made In Yorkshire, which provides details and an excellent overview of these films, in References). John Schlesinger, seen directing in the film, later also made Yanks in nearby Keighley in 1978. Schlesinger won an Oscar for director of Midnight Cowboy in 1969, which also won best film.Tom Courtenay, who was born in Hull, featured in many films located in Yorkshire, including The Dresser, also partly filmed in Bradford at the Alhambra Theatre. This co-starred Albert Finney who had played the Tom Courtenay part, Billy Fisher, on stage, but turned down playing the part in the film. Having starred in The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner the previous year, Billy Liar established Tom Courtenay, playing the lead character Billy Fisher, as a major actor. I thought I was the only one who did this. The interior secondary monologue for my own amusement, since when I manage to say out loud what I think is great fun and such an amazing observation--it turns out I am as alone as the little prince on his lonely planet. Find sources: "Keith Waterhouse"– news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR ( September 2009) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message) The classic comedy of a 50s youth trapped inside a Walter Mitty fantasy-world, published as a Penguin Essential for the first time. I have always loved this book and the film - and have even seen it on the stage as well. Strangely, it doesn’t seem to be as well known as I think it should be and I have by and large failed to get anybody else interested in the film. And, believe me, I have tried.An American adaptation entitled Billy and starring Steve Guttenberg, Peggy Pope, and James Gallery aired briefly on CBS in 1979. Of course, like all lazy sods, what he wants to be is a scriptwriter. And this dream is, supposedly, on the verge of being fulfilled - comedian Danny Boon has written to Billy offering him a job down in London. Yeah, right. The other one's got bells on Billy! The film belongs to the British New Wave, inspired by both the earlier kitchen sink realism movement and the French New Wave. Characteristic of the style is a documentary/ cinéma vérité feel and the use of real locations (in this case, many in the city of Bradford in Yorkshire [5]). This distinguishes Billy Liar from another contemporary coming-of-age novel, The Catcher in the Rye. The latter is a frame story in which Holden Caulfield starts the novel in an institution (jail? Mental health facility?) from which he’s due to be discharged, and he reflects on events since the previous Christmas. But while Billy and Holden are each confronted with their failures and choose to flee, their outcomes and trajectories are very different. One suggests growth and maturation, the other suggests recidivism.

Billy Liar, First Edition - AbeBooks Billy Liar, First Edition - AbeBooks

The title of the song " Twisterella" is also the title of a song that Billy co-writes in the novel. Keith Waterhouse's Billy Liar was published in 1959, and captures brilliantly the claustrophobic atmosphere of a small town. It tells the story of Billy Fisher, a Yorkshire teenager unable to stop lying - especially to his three girlfriends. Trapped by his boring job and working-class parents, Billy finds that his only happiness lies in grand plans for his future and fantastical day-dreams of the fictional country Ambrosia. Read more Details Grouped with the Angry Young Men of British letters, who came to prominence in the late 50s and early 60s, Waterhouse's most famous creation is less angry with the status quo of post-war Britain than Arthur Seaton and Jimmy Porter, instead finding an escape from his frustrations by living in a dream world half of the time.Billy Fisher lives with his parents and his grandma – albeit the latter might expire at some early or later stage – and the relationship is more than conflictual, it seems to be an eternal fight – especially with his father, who has had enough of his son’s clever, patronizing attitude and threatens to have all his things and the nineteen year old man out – which the hero or antihero might like to see resolved by moving to London, where he claims to have a job as a script writer, when all he has is a an answer from the comedian who states that though he had liked his jokes and pays for material, he does not have a staff, just some people who work with him, presumably as free lancers and on a part time basis, or just get money for humor that the artist can use… Billy Liar is the chronicle of one decisive day in the life of its protagonist Billy Fisher; capturing brilliantly the claustrophobic atmosphere of a small town in Yorkshire after the second world war, it describes a young fantasist with a job at a 'funeral furnisher' and a bedroom at his parents' – and longing for escape to the Good Life in London. Billy Liar". Reel Streets. Locations. Archived from the original on 20 June 2017 . Retrieved 24 November 2014. Guide to filming locations

Billy Liar - AbeBooks Billy Liar - AbeBooks

I first came across the name Billy Liar through the song of the same name recorded by The Decemberists in 2004, an upbeat piano driven pop song about a young man suffering from boredom, and it remains one of my favourite songs from the prolific band. His humor is exhilarating, even when it is dark – maybe especially then – as exemplified by what he wants to put on his tombstone – ‘here lies Billy Fisher’ – in recognition of the lies he cannot help himself from spitting out repeatedly – these range from the serious, maintaining he has a job with the famous comedian Billy Boone and he is going to London, to the futile, pretending he has a dog, sister, even presenting The Witch aka Barbara, one of his three girlfriends, to the mother of his best friend and infuriating her by saying this is his sibling and the woman retorts that she knows Barbara and this lie is insulting. Keith Waterhouse was born in Hunslet, Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire, England. He performed two years of national service in the Royal Air Force.This marvellous little novel covers a momentous Saturday in the life of nineteen-year-old Billy Fisher in a small town in Yorkshire. It’s 1959, and Billy’s lower-middleclass family wallows in the unchallenging comforts and conformity of dull, mediocre Stradhoughton. Everything is routine and predictable, which to the intelligent and creative Billy is unbearable, and he constantly retreats from the tedium into his inner fantasy world – Ambrosia – where he is a hero in the tradition of Thurber’s Walter Mitty. He fought long crusades to highlight what he perceived to be a decline in the standards of modern English; for example, he founded the Association for the Abolition of the Aberrant Apostrophe, whose members attempt to stem the tide of such solecisms as "potatoe's" and "pound's of apple's and orange's" in greengrocers' shops. [7] [8] Andrew Higson, ‘Space, Place, Spectacle: Landscape and Township in the ‘Kitchen Sink’ Film’, in Andrew Higson (ed.), Dissolving Views: Key Writings on British Cinema, Cassell, London, 1996. A brilliant novel, in language fresh and sweet, with characters vivid and singular in an inventive and dynamic story. It teems, it bursts with originality.’ - Saturday Review Find sources: "Billy Liar"– news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR ( May 2013) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)