Billy Connolly unplugged
ROSS COULTHART: Billy Connolly, welcome to Sunday Night.
BILLY CONOLLY: Thanks very much.
ROSS COULTHART: You've just come in from New Zealand, where apparently you're playing a dwarf chieftain in the next Hobbit film.
BILLY CONOLLY: That's right.
ROSS COULTHART: And you're coming here to Australia for this new movie, 'Brave'.
BILLY CONOLLY: Yes.
ROSS COULTHART: What are you in 'Brave'?
BILLY CONOLLY: I am the King of Scotland in 'Brave', Fergus. I'm a one-legged King of Scotland.
FERGUS: Littered with the weapons of fallen warriors, his face scarred, with one dead eye. I drew my sword and...
MERIDA: Whoosh! One swipe, his sword shattered, then chomp! Dad's leg was clean off.
BILLY CONOLLY: Well, it's really about my daughter. She is unruly.
MERIDA: I am Merida.
BILLY CONOLLY: But she is a kind of a wildfire archer. Myself and my wife want to marry her off.
ROSS COULTHART: You are a father of four daughters?
BILLY CONOLLY: Four daughters, yeah.
ROSS COULTHART: So is there a bit of Princess Merida in the four daughters?
BILLY CONOLLY: Oh, without question! Yeah, yeah. They're all rebels.
BILLY CONOLLY: I don't want to get married. I want to stay single and let my hair flow in the wind as I ride through the glen.
ROSS COULTHART: Are Australians a good audience?
BILLY CONOLLY: Excellent.
ROSS COULTHART: And when you first came to Australia...
BILLY CONOLLY: When I first came to Australia, I got smacked in the mouth.
ROSS COULTHART: Why was that? What happened?
BILLY CONOLLY: On stage, I told some joke a guy didn't like and he came rushing up on stage and belted me one. He was a Scottish-Australia prison officer, the guy.
ROSS COULTHART: Why are there so many Scotch prison officers? It is a fact, though, isn't it?
BILLY CONOLLY: I think it's because there are so many Scots in jail. They need somebody who can communicate with the customer.
BILLY CONOLLY: I'm not as young as I was. None of us are. I don't think I'm old, I don't feel old, but I have noticed certain distinctive change coming over me recently. My hair is changing colour. I've got the winter plumage on now. And at the back, it has gone a kind of Turkish hooker blonde… which I must say suits me down to the ground. My nose hair is accelerating for reasons best known to yourself. I used to cut it once every 30 years. Now it's, like, twice a month. I'm presuming the body know what it is doing. I am very baffled. I wonder what's going to happen to me that's going to need a long nasal hair to deal with it.
ROSS COULTHART: Now, the most important turning point for you was when Michael Parkinson decided to put a bloke with a thick Scots accent on his program.
BILLY CONOLLY: That's right.
ROSS COULTHART: At the time, it was one of the biggest shows in the UK.
BILLY CONOLLY: That's right, it was the biggest show.
ROSS COULTHART: What was that like?
BILLY CONOLLY: It was extraordinary.
MICHAEL PARKINSON: Ladies and gentlemen, a very special welcome, please, to Billy Connolly.
BILLY CONOLLY: And I told a joke about a bicycle stuck in a woman's bum - a guy had killed his wife and left her bum sticking out of the ground, and he showed his friend. Sure enough, there was a big mound of earth, there was her bum sticking out. He says, "Is that her?" He says, "Aye." He says, "Why did you leave her bum sticking out for?" He says, "I need somewhere to park my bike." And it just ripped everybody to bits. And on my way into the gig, in the limo, my manager said, "Whatever you do, don't tell that joke about the bum."
BILLY CONOLLY: You ever notice a Glasgow drunk, he walks with one leg.
ROSS COULTHART: And what did that do for you, that exposure on national TV?
BILLY CONOLLY: It was just like scoring a goal. It was like scoring a goal at the Cup final. I existed. I was a big shot.
ROSS COULTHART: What did it do to you inside, though? I mean, why does fame so often send people off the rails? I mean, you were hitting the grog in a big way, you were doing drugs.
BILLY CONOLLY: Yeah. No, what I did wasn't so much go and hit the grog in a big way. I just carried on drinking the way I had been when I was a welder.
ROSS COULTHART: How bad did it get, though? I mean, panellists basically described you as a total nightmare at one stage.
BILLY CONOLLY: Yeah, you know, most people who drink heavily, sometimes you have blackouts - you can't remember what you did - but slowly it comes back. Well, you enter a stage then when it doesn't come back, and you don't remember until you drink again, so you have a drinking memory and a sober memory. You have two memories, and you think, "My God, I'm becoming two guys." That was what frightened me more, the thought, "My God, I'm mentally ill."
ROSS COULTHART: Did she save your life?
BILLY CONOLLY: I think so, yeah.
ROSS COULTHART: I can remember there's a fantastic moment where she's playing, or lampooning, Janet Street-Porter.
BILLY CONOLLY: That is the day I met her.
PAMELA: Billy, I understand when you first came to England, people had a lot of trouble understanding your accent. Is that right?
BILLY CONOLLY: Sorry?
ROSS COULTHART: The other thing about Pamela is that she is a psychologist...
BILLY CONOLLY: Yes.
ROSS COULTHART: ..and a very good one. What is it like being married to a woman who can psychoanalyse you?
BILLY CONOLLY: It is kind of weird, I must say, at first, but it is OK now. Especially, recently I have been drawing pictures, and I just let myself go, and a lot of people in them are blindfolded and tied up and being led along and stuff, and I said, "What do you think?", and she said, "None of your business."
BILLY CONOLLY: And I'll tell you something else! Christians shouldn't be allowed near rock 'n' roll. It's not for them…He's my saviour.
ROSS COULTHART: Are you an atheist? Do you believe in a god?
BILLY CONOLLY: Yes, I don't believe in gods. As a matter of fact, I don't even know if I don't believe in God - I think the question is too big - but I know I don't believe in the church.
ROSS COULTHART: I mean, how strongly do you feel about it? There's been horrific revelations of the Catholic Church covering up abuse.
BILLY CONOLLY: I'm totally baffled by it because if it was, like... Suppose it wasn't the Catholic Church, supposing it was the army that had been doing that or a company, like Apple, where all the CEOs had been doing it and been covering it up, they would be out of business tomorrow.
ROSS COULTHART: Yeah.
BILLY CONOLLY: They would all be in jail.
ROSS COULTHART: You obviously suffered horrific abuse as a child.
BILLY CONOLLY: Yes.
ROSS COULTHART: Your father was abusive, your aunt, who replaced your mum, who walked out on the family, she was abusive. Do you find that that sometimes comes back, that that experience in your life bubbles up into your present day?
BILLY CONOLLY: Oh, it has to. It has to. And, actually, it adds to your life. If you get a grip of yourself and you don't wander off into drugs or booze, all these things help.
ROSS COULTHART: I was going to say, do you think it has helped people?
BILLY CONOLLY: Oh, I know it has! Just to unload - what I did was say to people was, "Look, this is not your fault."Put it down as like "a big rucksack full of brick you're carrying around. "It is nothing to do with you, it is none of your damn business. "You just happen to be the victim."
ROSS COULTHART: The turning point for you, I understand, or one of the turning points, was when you almost killed yourself in a car crash outside a town called Weston-super-Mare.
BILLY CONOLLY: Weston-super-Mare, yeah.
ROSS COULTHART: I fell over laughing when I read that because John Cleese...
BILLY CONOLLY: That's his home town.
ROSS COULTHART: That is his home town, and he lampoons that town as one of the most boring places in England. Have you ever told him that?
BILLY CONOLLY: No, I haven't. He doesn't have much time for me.
ROSS COULTHART: Oh, really?! You don't get on?
BILLY CONOLLY: No, we get on, but he looks very bored when I'm talking to him. He tends to look away and look out the window.
BILLY CONOLLY: The most terrible thing I found recently was I tend to make a noise when I bend down. I don't know how long I've been doing this but I caught myself the other day
going...(groans)How long have I been doing that?
ROSS COULTHART: Billy, you're turning 70 this year, which is incredible.
BILLY CONOLLY: Even as we speak, I'm turning 70.
ROSS COULTHART: Do you feel you can keep on doing the live performances and the stage and the theatre?
BILLY CONOLLY: Yeah, like most people, I feel 35. Nobody feels 70. How old do you feel?
ROSS COULTHART: Well, I feel in my 40s but I've just turned 50.
BILLY CONOLLY: Well, yeah! Well, I feel 37.
ROSS COULTHART: Well, that's good.
BILLY CONOLLY: And I have done for ages.
ROSS COULTHART: I think what anybody looking at your story can take away from it, Billy Connolly, is that you have not only brought love and laughter to so many millions of people around the world, you have also passed that message on that anyone can do it.
BILLY CONOLLY: Oh, it can be done. You know, you have to apply yourself. A lot of people say, "He is gifted and talented." You know these kinds of expressions they use. Well, nobody is born... Well, occasionally, you know, you get these prodigies who can suddenly play great violin when they are three, but they are odd, and they're usually quite unhappy. But most people, most rock stars and comedians started with nothing and learned it. You know, it is a lot of hard work at first, but it doesn't seem hard work
at the time because you get the dream going at the same time.
BILLY CONOLLY: Billy Connolly, thank you for making all of us laugh. Thank you very much, indeed.
BILLY CONOLLY: Good on you.
ROSS COULTHART: Cheers, man!
BILLY CONOLLY: I've got to keep doing it till I fall off the edge.
BILLY CONOLLY: Is it hard, though, being on the road, away from family? I mean, do you miss the family? Yeah, well, everybody misses their family. Soldiers and sailors miss their families. Cameramen miss their family. Everybody, you're supposed to miss your family. I've said it to guys over the years. They say, "I just wish I'd spent more time with my family." And I said, "What are you talking about? That's your gig." Whether you're hunting lions in the Serengeti Plain or you're a welder, your job is to leave and to make the money for the family - that is the man's role. Don't give me this, "I wish I was more at home, darning socks" shit. I tell you what, I wish I could give that to my wife.
ROSS COULTHART: I'm gonna go home and say that.
BILLY CONOLLY: That's a man's gig. You're supposed to be out cutting it, making it for your kids.
ROSS COULTHART: Kerry, that is a man's gig.
BILLY CONOLLY: Tell her I said so.
ROSS COULTHART: Good on you, Billy. Thanks very much, mate. I appreciate it.
BILLY CONOLLY: She'll slap you and never speak to you again.
