‘I feel life slipping away’ reveals comedy legend Billy in TV show
SIR Billy Connolly has told how he feels life “slipping away” as he is stripped of his talents ahead of another adventure, “in the spirit world”.
The Glasgow comedy legend, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2013, also revealed how he fights with the realisation that the condition is only going to worsen, and sometimes gets angry with it.
Speaking in the second and final part of a new BBC Scotland documentary ‘Billy Connolly, Made in Scotland’ to be shown on Friday, he tells how attributes including his famous banjo playing skills are diminishing one by one.
He said: “My life is slipping away and I can feel it, and I should, I’m 75. I’m near the end – I’m a damn sight nearer the end than I am the beginning – but it doesn’t frighten me.
“It’s an adventure, and it’s quite interesting to see myself slipping away. Bits slip off – talents leave and attributes leave.
“I don’t have the balance I used to have; I don’t have the energy I used to have; I can’t hear the way I used to hear; I can’t see as well as I used to.
“It’s like somebody is in charge of you and they’re saying ‘right, I added all these bits when you were a youth, and now it’s time to subtract’.
“I can’t work my left hand on the banjo. It’s as if I’m being prepared for something.”