Based on the 1959 novel by Keith Waterhouse, Billy Liar is now a John Schlesinger classic movie from 1963. It is one of the "British New Wave" films of the 1960's, all in black and white. It seems an awfully long time since I saw this film, maybe even when it was first released.
Ian Nathan introduces the programme as usual. But he calls these young people "the disillusioned generation". This is rubbish. That was not me or anyone I knew. And Billy is not disillusioned, just a fantasist. We hear all about Keith Waterhouse, first as a reporter, but first and foremost just wanting to write. All the time he was at the Daily Mirror and the Daily Mail, he was writing in his spare time, short stories, plays, anything. His parents were "impossibly poor", but that would not be how they felt at the time. As maybe our parents came into that category in the 1950's.
Christina Newland tells us that when the book was first published, the country was still in the age of austerity. Steven Armstrong talked about the beginnings of the consumer society and Neil Norman about the theatre of the 1950's with plays from "angry young men" such as Look Back in Anger by John Osborne. In fact the first adaptation of the Billy Liar book was actually a stage play, first starring Albert Finney and then Tom Courtney when he took over. Christina tells us about the choice of actor for the film, and all the team agree that Tom Courtney was perfect for the role of Billy.
Ian Nathan tells us about the director John Schlesinger. How he used his camera out in the real world. We see Julie Christie out walking with real people watching her. Ian explains how we enter Billy's dreams of "self delusion". Christina added that these sequences often were cut so abruptly in the editing. Neil Norman liked the double act of Billy and Arthur (an early role for Rodney Bewes before his long time in The Likely Lads. We see a clip of them in the funeral parlour. And then who arrives to tell them off but their boss played by ... Leonard Rossiter!
Ian thought the entire cast were great. These included the one and only Wilfred Pickles. Now I remember his radio show Have a Go that ran from 1946 to 1967, it was always on at home. Christina describes the "generational divide" between the older generation and the new. Whilst on the cast, there is a part about the heavenly Julie Christie. Here she is on one of her walks, going past one of the London bomb sites that were still there in the early sixties. Her next film was Darling.
I think that it was Steven who told us much of the filming took place in Bradford. Ian goes back to the director and how the film elevated the docudrama. One clip we see is the opening of a huge brand new supermarket with a celebrity, a band and large crowds. I can remember my father around this time being given the task to convert some of his firm's grocery stores to supermarkets. Ian and Christina talk about the fantasy element of the film, and Chekov is mentioned. Neil Norman sums up the movie as a "bittersweet comedy but with underlying tragedy". Although there is a spark of hope for Billy at the Locarno ballroom. A song that he composed with Arthur is played there. Steven's final thoughts were on all those sitcoms that came in the future when Billy Liar had paved the way.
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