Billy Pearce
| Billy Pearce | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1 February 1951 |
| Medium | Stand-up |
| Nationality | British |
| Years active | 1974–present |
| Genres | Rapid-fire gags and jokes |
| Website | Official website |
Billy Pearce (born 1 February 1951) 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". He particularly loves performing at the Alhambra Theatre in Bradford, where he consistently breaks box office records
Pearce was born in Leeds in 1951. 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.
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 double act Cannon and Ball. He has also starred in his own show entitled The Billy Pearce Laughter Show at Blackpool's Grand Theatre and at Bournemouth's BIC. In 1989, Pearce fronted his own BBC television series, You gotta be joking, and he appeared regularly as a guest on numerous game shows, entertainment and chat shows. He appeared at the 1991 Royal Variety Performance and the 1993 Children's Royal Variety Performance which he hosted alongside sports broadcaster David Coleman. In the show, Pearce played Billy Jones. 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.
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