Billy Liar

Billy Liar is a novel by Keith Waterhouse[?]. It concerns the activities of a Walter Mitty[?]-style character, a young man from a working-class background who has greater aspirations.

In 1963, it was made into a film with Tom Courtenay in the role of Billy and Julie Christie as his love interest. Mona Washbourne[?] played his mother, and Wilfred Pickles[?] his father. Rodney Bewes[?] played his best friend.

The novel was also used as the basis for a television sitcom series of the 1970s (which has never been rerun), and was made into a successful West End musical (entitled simply Billy) starring Michael Crawford.

Waterhouse later wrote a sequel called Billy Liar on the Moon