Comedy veteran Billy Connolly is sharing his hard-earned insights into how to live a happy life – and they include avoiding sprouts.
He has stopped touring but the veteran comedian shares his pearls of wisdom with fans in a new TV series.
In Billy Connolly Does..., shot in and around his Florida home, the 79-year-old sage also dispenses such gems as always avoiding nylon sheets.
And as Billy opens up about his family life, he recommends a policy of surrendering to your children. Billy was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2013, leading to him quitting live performances five years later.
He now spends his days fishing, watching TV and drawing.
His quiet life is enriched by the reassuring and constant presence of his second wife, Pamela Stephenson.
Viewers will see the close connection the pair share, with Billy talking at length about how much he owes to her.
Billy says: “She’s incredibly bright and she can do four things at once. And she can speed-read. And she knows how you buy a house, I haven’t a clue.
“It works out brilliantly and she knows how to look after the children, how to get them into school and out of school and into the world.
“She does all of that and I smile in the background and say funny things from time to time.”
In the show, which also features comedy from Billy’s archives, he admits: “I’m kind of blissfully unaware of how the world works.
“It’s a sin, really. I’ve been looked after by managers and people all my life. And now it’s Pamela and the children.”
- Billy Connolly Does... from UKTV starts on Gold on Thursday at 9pm.
On love
Love is easy. It’s everything else that’s hard. Love’s the easiest thing on Earth. It just falls on you and devours you, and all you can do is return it.
It’s the biggest gift.
On nature
The world is an amazing place. There’s an immensity about the world. You’re not supposed to understand it. You’re supposed to be wowed by it. You have to treat it with deep respect.
I hope we haven’t blown it.
On aging
I don’t begrudge it at all. It’s a very natural thing and I’m quite prepared to accept it and live with it. It’s great to have these experiences to think of in your old age, that you were once a somebody.
On sheets
I was filming for an American company and they got me a hotel room with Pamela, but it had nylon sheets, the bed. I’ve never known anything like it.
You cannot have sex with nylon sheets – can’t get any purchase.
On travel
When I was about fourteen, a friend of mine, John McNabb, his family were going to Blackpool for a September weekend, and asked me would I like to come and I said, ‘I’d love to.’
I’d never been anywhere outside Glasgow, except to Rothsay for my holidays. And it was such an adventure. And I went and stayed in a boarding house with them and it was brilliant. I got a real taste for travelling, and it never left me.
On life now
My body’s saying, get a grip on yourself. Live, laugh, relax. I draw, and I play the banjo badly, and I fish, and I’m as happy as a clam.
What do you think? Have your say in the comments below
I have a luxurious life. There’s a lovely atmosphere here. There’s a lot of freedom. A lot of dreamers.
On his wife
I was trousered when I met Pamela. She came to see me in Brighton and came backstage.
We were back in the hotel and I had about 20 brandies. A ridiculous amount. We had gin tours, cider tours. That was the beginning.
On Florida
I lived in New York, and I loved it, in Manhattan, but in winter it becomes an ice rink, and I like to walk everywhere.
I just couldn’t balance it any more. I had to get out of there.
On houses
On sprouts
I hate sprouts. I hate them to the point that I wouldn’t be in a house where there’s sprouts. And I suffered as a child being made to eat them.
I don’t know how people can do that. You’ll stay here until you finish it.
On gardens
Gardens are good, back gardens are better. You can be more yourself in a back garden.
It was lovely, the big house, with a lake you could fish in. You can fish in your slippers. Sometimes life gets unbearably sweet.
On his home
My Florida home was a drug trafficker’s house. The garage... there’s no back!
You go in and shut the door and your car’s in the garden, and you can escape to the river.
On houses
Buying houses is simple. Look at the house, stand back, listen, see if there’s any rock music playing, like from a guy lying under a car with the doors open.
You’re doomed if you buy it. Check for dead animals. That’s a bad sign in a neighbour.
