PARKY BILLY DIDN’T KNOW WHO I WAS Broadcaster’s dinner sadness
COMEDIAN STRUGGLING TO RECOGNISE PALS
SIR Billy Connolly now has trouble recognising his oldest friends, Sir Michael Parkinson has said.
The comedian, 75, who made his Parkinson’s disease diagnosis public five years ago, struggled to remember Parky over dinner recently.
The broadcaster was in New York to present Billy with an award but told ITV’s Saturday Morning With James Martin that his old pal couldn’t place him and asked how long they’d known each other.
Michael, 83, said: “The sadness of Billy now is that wonderful brain is dulled.
“I saw him recently, he’s now living in America, and it was very sad, because I was presenting him with a prize at an award ceremony.
“We had an awkward dinner together because I wasn’t quite sure if he knew who I was or not.”
He went on: “But we were walking out after the presentation to go down and have our picture taken, and he turned to me and put his hand on my shoulders.”
Michael said Billy “wasn’t sure where [the dinner] was or what context at all”.
In 1975, although already famous in Scotland, Billy became a massive star across the UK when he appeared on BBC’s Parkinson show.
Billy said it “changed my entire life” and the two became instant friends, with Billy appearing on the talk show 15 times over the years.
The Glasgow comedian went public with his Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2013.
Michael said: “To know someone as long as I knew and loved Billy… it was an awful thing to contemplate, that that had been taken from him in a sense.
“He was just a genius and the best thing that happened to me on the show.”
The diagnosis came after Billy had surgery for prostate cancer.
Parkinson’s affects the brain and causes involuntary shaking, slow movement and stiff muscles.
It can also affect smell, disrupt sleep patterns, cause balance and memory problems and spark depression and anxiety. There is no cure.
Billy has spoken of how he copes with the condition.
In April last year, he said: “When I’m in front of people and performing, I don’t give it much attention.
“And I perform in spite of it. That’s why I put on the song A Whole Lot of Shakin’ Goin’ On – just to stick two fingers up to it.
“There’s a whole lot of shaking going on. It’s kind of weird, this instability. The only time it stops is when I’m in bed and then I can’t roll over.
“I’m like a big log. It’s the first thing I think about in the morning because getting out of bed is quite hard.”
He added: “It’s weird. I’m trying to stay on the light side because the dark side is unthinkable.”
In June, Billy delighted staff at the Kincraig Castle Hotel in Easter Ross after a two-day stay.
He posed for pictures with staff and left a signed photo of himself receiving his knighthood.
He’s also a regular visitor to Rothesay on the Isle of Bute.
Earlier in June, he popped into a bakery run by a Syrian family who fled the civil war in their country.
Tasnim Helmi and her family had no idea that they were serving coffee and cake to one of the world’s most famous Scots.
She said: “He was a fabulous, friendly guy.”
We had an awkward dinner. I wasn’t sure if he knew who I was MICHAEL PARKINSON ON BILLY’S STRUGGLES