Billy Fane (born Malcolm Collins; 1947 or 1948) is an English former actor and comedian. He came to prominence in 1989 as Geoff Keegan, the manager of the Byker Grove

youth club A youth center or youth centre, often called youth club, is a place where young people can meet and participate in a variety of activities, for example table football, association football (US soccer, UK football), basketball, table tennis, v ...

featured in the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

television series of the same name. He remained in the role for eleven years (twelve series), until his character was

killed off The killing off of a character is a device in fiction, whereby a character dies, but the story continues. The term, frequently applied to television, film, video game, literature, anime, manga and chronological series, often denotes an untimely o ...

in a gas explosion. He won a

BAFTA The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA, ) is an independent trade association and charity that supports, develops, and promotes the arts of film, television and video games in the United Kingdom. In addition to its annual awa ...

award for his performance in a ''Byker Grove'' episode. Fane left school with no qualifications. During his years as comedian on the club circuit, he was known as Little Billy Fane. After leaving ''Byker Grove'', Fane appeared in

pantomimes Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment, generally combining gender-crossing actors and topical humour with a story more or less based on a well-known fairy tale, fable or f ...

around his native

North East England North East England, commonly referred to simply as the North East within England, is one of nine official regions of England. It consists of County DurhamNorthumberland, , Northumberland, Tyne and Wear and part of northern North Yorkshire. ...

. He also trained to become a teacher and worked with

dyslexic Dyslexia (), previously known as word blindness, is a learning disability that affects either reading or writing. Different people are affected to different degrees. Problems may include difficulties in spelling words, reading quickly, writ ...

adults. He obtained a

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...

in Special Education Needs and Intuitive Learning from the

University of Hull The University of Hull is a public research university in Kingston upon Hull, a city in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It was founded in 1927 as University College Hull. The main university campus is located in Hull and is home to the Hu ...

. The school had a contract for providing education to young offenders around the United Kingdom. Fane went on to appear as Mr Braithwaite, the pianist in ''

Billy Elliot ''Billy Elliot'' is a 2000 British coming-of-age Comedy film, comedy-drama film directed by Stephen Daldry and written by Lee Hall (playwright), Lee Hall. Set in County Durham in North East England during the 1984–1985 miners' strike, the fi ...

'' (2000). The same year, he appeared in ''

Purely Belter ''Purely Belter'' is a 2000 British comedy drama film directed by Mark Herman about two teenagers (Chris Beattie and Greg McLane) trying to get money, by any means necessary, in order to get season tickets for home games of Premier League footbal ...

''. In 2001, he appeared in the television series '' Heartbeat''. In 2002, Fane reverted to using his birth name of Malcolm Collins. He was a special-needs coordinator at New College Durham and was working with inmates of Castington Young Offenders Institution.

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* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fane, Billy Living people 1940s births English male film actors English male television actors English male comedians Alumni of the University of Hull BAFTA winners (people)