Billy Pearce
(born in Leeds, West Yorkshire) is an award winning English performer, comedian, actor and entertainer. A regular on UK television in the 1980s and 1990s, Pearce has been described as a "supreme entertainer". His summer shows and pantomimes regularly break box office records. [1]
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BILLY PEARCE TICKETS
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Early life
Pearce was born in Leeds in 1954. His father was a pianist and his mother Jean was a "respected" dance teacher, notably teaching a young
Malandra Burrows to perform.
He took up
ballet as a child, developing a penchant for performing after appearing in amateur productions for Leeds Thespians and operatic companies.
Despite this, Pearce had aspirations to be an
engineer originally. This changed after he had a serious motorbike accident, which altered his outlook on life. He has explained, "From then on I couldn’t settle and I did lots of different jobs. I’d never been out of Leeds and the surgeon who operated on me let me stay at his place on an island in the Adriatic. I was the only British person on the island. All those things changed my life and I couldn’t settle after that. I certainly couldn’t go back to working in an engineering factory day after day [...] I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I just drifted."
He moved to
Iceland for a period, worked on fish docks, was a dresser for
Yorkshire Television and a stage hand at
Leeds Grand. Pearce, who had always loved entertaining people, then found employment as a
redcoat for the British holiday camp
Butlins in 1970, with a friend who had attended his mother’s dancing school; together they formed a musical double act, known as the Stewart Brothers. Stanley Joseph of
Leeds City Varieties was impressed by the act and got them a booking playing alternate nights at a cabaret club in
Barnsley and the Fiesta club in
Sheffield. Pearce then went solo and set his sights on becoming a club-filler.
Career in showbusiness
Pearce began his career in mainstream
showbusiness as a "variety entertainer". He first rose to prominence when he appeared in the televised talent show
New Faces
in 1986, where he reached the final. Due to his success on the show, Pearce began to appear more regularly on stage and television throughout the 1980s and 1990s. He worked with
Danny La Rue and was the
compere for comedy doubleact
Cannon and Ball. He has also starred in his own "summer spectacular" entitled
The Billy Pearce Laughter Show
at
Blackpool's
Grand Theatre and at
Bournemouth's
BIC.
[2]
In 1989, Pearce fronted his own
BBC television series,
You gotta be joking
, and he appeared regularly as a guest on nuemorus gameshows, entertainment and chat shows. He has been invited to appear at the
Royal Variety Performance
(first appearing in 1991), and 'the
Children's Royal Variety Performance
, which he had been chosen to host in 1993. As of 2008, Pearce has performed in five children's Royal Variety shows and three Royal Variety shows in total. Successful in the variety entertainment genre, in 1994 he won the
British Comedy Award
for "Top Theatre Variety Performer", beating popular personalities of the time, such as
Ken Dodd and
Michael Barrymore. That same year he also received the
Sir James Carreras Award for "Outstanding New Talent". Prior to this he was voted Club Mirror's solo comedian of the year by fellow professionals in 1988, and followed this with best television comedy newcomer at the
London Palladium.
[3]
He has been a regular on stage, performing a summer season with acts such as
Tommy Trinder at the Spa Pavilion,
Felixstowe, and topping the bill at the Grand Theatre, Blackpool in 1993. He completed two summer seasons at the Grand Theatre Blackpool in 2000 and 2001, originally with
John Inman and then with
Joe Longthorne and
Keith Harris, starred at the Pavilion Theatre,
Weymouth in 1994, and at the
Futurist Theatre,
Scarborough, in 1995. He has also headlined in numerous
pantomimes, topping the bill and breaking successive box office records at the
Alhambra Theatre,
Bradford in
Aladdin
(1994 -1995), as Buttons in
Cinderella
(1997), alongside
Amanda Barrie in
Snow White
(2002-2003), and in
Jack and the Beanstalk
at the
Hull New Theatre (2001-2002).
From 2003-2004 he appeared once again at Bradford Alhambra in the highest grossing pantomime in its history.
Pearce has acted on television in shows such as
ITV's
Heartbeat
in 2001,
and in 2004 he turned to musical theatre, appearing in
Boogie Nights
as Roddie O’Neil at Blackpool’s Grand Theatre. At the time he commented, "A musical is something I’ve always wanted to do but people said: ‘No, you’re a comic, that’s what you do. They said the same thing when I was wanting to try pantomime: ‘You’re a club comic.’ I just want the opportunity to show people what I can do."
He went on to star in the musical, the
Rocky Horror Show
in 2007 as the guest narrator.
[4]
2008 saw Billy performing at
Bridlington Spa Theatre,
Blackpool Tower and
Skegness Embassy Theatre in 'Billy Pearce's Big Night Out' along with Linda Newport,
Neil hurst and
Safire (illusionists) [5]
In 2009 Billy is Touring Theatres in the UK.
- Comdey Night Out Tour / in May and some dates in June with Jimmy Cricket and Mick Miller
Catchphrase
In many of Billy Pearce's Summer shows and pantomimes , he uses the catchphrase "Hi 'er Boys and Girls" to much comic effect. He often displays a silly accent or voice to heighten this effect.
On TV he often used 'I will tell you when!' (For laughing at his jokes and applause etc)
References
- Broadening his horizons - Billy Pearce
- Billy Pearce
- Billy Pearce
- Leeds funny man to narrate Rocky Horror Show
- http://www.billypearce.moonfruit.com/#/summer2008/4530367627