Bill Bailey (American actor)

For other people named Bill Bailey see the William Bailey (disambiguation) page.

Bill Bailey (born 1938), is an American actor and author, primarily providing supporting roles in film and television throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. He appeared in Superman (1978), Superman II (1980), and Haunted Honeymoon (1986), as well as a number of British television programs including Yes, Prime Minister (1987), Jeeves and Wooster (1992), and Agatha Christie's Poirot (1993). He has also narrated an abridged version of Herman Melville's novel "Moby Dick".
A number of Internet databases have misattributed his work to the British comedian Bill Bailey.

Bill Bailey as himself c.1984
Clutching a shot of whisky and one of his beloved pipes.

Bailey was born in a small rural town in North Carolina and attended Sanford Central High School. He graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1960 with a degree in philosophy, spent some time in the US Army, and then as prison guard in Canada. He married a Texan heiress, and moved to Houston, Texas where he managed a ranch and took part in motorbike scrambling and sports car rallying. He worked as a bouncer, and later organised the first white collar union in the US meat-packing industry. Soon after taking up acting he moved to London in 1968 and within a year of his arrival he became the first full-frontal male nude on the British stage at the Almost Free Theatre, London. He has acted in film, television and on London’s West End stage.

He is the author of seven published books, most notably Taping Whores (2004).