Review of: Billy Liar, by Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall. Directed by Ian Crowe

Courtesy of the Hampshire Chronicle and the Black Boy writers group

[Details page for this production]

By Jacqueline Redway

When I was a child I watched Billy Liar as sitcom on the television. Later I saw the 1963 film starring Tom Courtney so I was keen to see the play at the Chesil Theatre. It did not disappoint. Under the direction of Ian Crowe, I laughed out loud while squirming in anguish as Keith Waterhouse’s story of a compulsive liar unfolded.

James Gaynor played Billy with an air of wide eyed desperation. Early on he undergoes a three way assault from his grandma Florence who always knows ‘what he needs…’ a truly believable performance by Norma York, his despairing mother Alice (Heather Bryant) and hectoring bully of a father Jeffrey (Steve Clark).

As Billy turns his back on his attackers one could see him buckling under the weight of their tirade, but he quickly recovered ready with the next tall story.

The intimate size of the Chesil draws the audience into the oppressive late 50’s living-room. It is clear why Billy tries to escape his life by living a fantasy. His only way out appears to be a job in London writing gags for a comedian. I could not help wondering if this was for real or another one of Billy’s delusions.

Billy came in for a further battering from his two righteously indignant fiancées. Wonderfully prim orange eating Barbara (Xanthe Simmans) colludes with Billy’s fantasies creating an idyllic vision of life together in a Devon cottage.

There were some classic comic moments as Billy tried to seduce her aided by ‘passion pills’ provided by his ebullient friend Arthur (Simon Wakeford). The tarty Rita played with gusto by Harriet Gandy was the opposite side of the coin, always up for a ‘snog’ down Foley Bottoms.

Possible liberation happens for Billy in the shape of Liz vibrantly played by Emma Nias. As a couple they glowed. Liz persuades Billy to make his escape on the mid-night train to London with her. The audience held their breath. Will he? Won’t he?

This was my first visit to the Chesil Theatre. They will definitely be seeing me in the audience again.

Jacqueline Redway
Black Boy Writing Group
 

Two more reviews - unedited - from the Black Boy writers' group

(1) Silly Billy by Kath Whiting

Billy Liar is a kitchen sink classic about a young man who like the title tells us, is not limited by telling the truth.

These days we would be more likely to see Super Nanny flown in to tame wayward Billy, before you could say attention deficit disorder.

With a strong cast and script that journeys from comedy to tragedy, this fifty year old play was still entertaining and
provoking. The set itself was a lesson in social history for the young and a nostalgia trip for more mature audience members.

First onstage was Norma York’s beautifully observed shuffling grandmother. She wound the clock up and set the theme of time running out. We were then confronted by Billy’s parents; the impotent fury of Geoffrey and the despairing drudgery of Alice.

Despite the heavy handed blaming on grammar schooling for their son’s compulsive lying and the fact that these characters are now stereotypes, they were still sympathetic, with much credit to Steve Clark and Heather Bryant for giving them three dimensions. Then Billy burst in, full of energy and escaping his family’s drab reality through his tall stories and wonderful contradiction of girlfriends.

His desperate excitement to get to London to take the job of scriptwriter was possibly just another fantasy and the audience were left for much of the play to ponder this. It would have been easy to make Billy a clown, but James Gaynor balanced his antics with more subtle and emotional performances in the serious scenes.

The first act had a feel of farce with Billy’s love potions and collecting of fiancés. Xanthe Williams was fantastically prudish as Barbara. With her never-ending supply of oranges and Billy’s fabricated dreams of a cottage in Devon, these
scenes were light-hearted fun.

Later, when she politely tried to alert the fighting father and son to the grandmother’s fitting and then slumped body, the atmosphere twisted to a hilariously darker comedy.

The play became darker again and more rotten with the harsh violence of Rita, and Billy’s friend Arthur’s allegiance flipping into exasperation. Harriet Gandy’s hostility was tangible and frightening while Simon Wakeford worked well to make an extreme change in sympathies ring true.

Let Billy’s imagination run loose and he would have cut everybody’s legs off, but the audience were with him and when we met Liz, his third and true love, we were happy Billy finally had his imaginative match. Emma Nias played Liz as a scruffy fairy godmother and Billy’s lifeline.

Some themes don’t date and one is an English family’s reliance on tea to soothe absolutely everything. Another is the telling of a good tale, however tall. Just don’t let the clock run down.

(2) TRUTHFULLY-BILLY LIAR CHESIL SUCCESS Brett Gill

The Chesil theatre players captured the humdrum, drabness of life in a working class family ‘up North’ perfectly. Keith  Waterhouse’s script came to life as the aged Nora Batty granma, (Florence) , delivered her pithy grumpiness in the third person to anyone in earshot.

Her long-suffering pillar of the family daughter poignantly portrayed by Heather Bryant made you wince as yet another blow fell on her life.

Her weak and frustrated husband , (Steve Clark),was goaded by his son’s fecklessness and his own jealousness of the Grammar School education he had forced on him into impotent rages.

The undoubted star of this cameo performance was James Gaynor as Billy. He struggled with his inner desire to escape his parent’s and his own pigeonholed clerking existence.

Living in a private world of fantasy, peopled with imaginary ship’s captains, war veterans and legless relatives he weaved his lies throughout his friends and family. The stories were so
obviously incredible to everyone, except his desperately dim but determined to catch her man fiancée (Xanthe Simmans), that his amoral irresponsibility exasperated one and all.

Billy’s friends , male and female were effectively cast,(played by Simon Wakeford, Harriet Gandy, and Emma Nias),their
roles supported the impossible daydream world he lived in.

Peter Liddiard’s set was perfect 1950’s front room and gloriously beige Dralon featureless, highlighting Billy’s need for a glimpse of another more exciting world.

Listening to his excruciatingly absurd excuses for one mess after another underlined his desperation and the deeper underlying message of Waterhouse’s warts and all snapshot of the monotony and weight of ordinary folk living in the manufacturing North of England in the days of ‘Them and Us’.
It was entirely believable and relevant , however, for today’s nuclear , one parent family life.

Growing up and trying to be an individual against the relentless tide of parental hopes and fears and an almost predestined slot in society hasn’t changed much 50 years on. Messrs Cameron & Clegg take note. A very entertaining and thought provoking evening, professionally delivered,. Can’t wait for their next one……

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