List of Famous people named Billy
Billy Beane
William Lamar Beane III is an American professional baseball player and current front office executive. He is the executive vice president of baseball operations and minority owner of the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball (MLB); he is also minority owner of Barnsley FC of the EFL Championship in England and AZ Alkmaar of the Eredivisie in the Netherlands. From 1984 to 1989 he played in MLB as an outfielder for the New York Mets, Minnesota Twins, Detroit Tigers, and Oakland Athletics. He joined the Athletics' front office as a scout in 1990, was named general manager after the 1997 season, and was promoted to executive vice president after the 2015 season.
Billy Napier
William "Billy" Hall Napier is an American football coach serving as head coach of University of Louisiana at Lafayette Ragin' Cajun football team.
Billy Porter
Billy Porter is an American actor and singer. He attended Taylor Allderdice, graduated from Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama, and achieved fame performing on Broadway before starting a solo career as a singer and actor.
Billy Connolly
Sir William Connolly is a Scottish artist, musician, presenter, actor, and retired stand-up comedian. He is sometimes known, especially in his homeland, by the Scots nickname The Big Yin. Known for his idiosyncratic and often improvised observational comedy, frequently including profanity, Connolly is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential stand-up comedians of all time, having topped many polls conducted in the United Kingdom.
Billy Magnussen
William Gregory Magnussen is an American actor. He is known for roles in Into the Woods (2014), Birth of the Dragon (2016), Game Night (2018), Aladdin (2019) and No Time to Die (2021).
Billy Bob Thornton
Billy Bob Thornton is an American actor, filmmaker, and musician. He had his first break when he co-wrote and starred in the 1992 thriller One False Move, and received international attention after writing, directing, and starring in the independent drama film Sling Blade (1996), for which he won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. He appeared in several major film roles in the 1990s following Sling Blade, including Oliver Stone's neo-noir U Turn (1997), political drama Primary Colors (1998), science fiction disaster film Armageddon (1998), the highest-grossing film of that year, and the crime drama A Simple Plan (1998), which earned him his third Oscar nomination.
Billy McFarland
William Z. McFarland is an American convicted fraudster who co-founded the ill-fated Fyre Festival. He defrauded investors of $27.4 million by marketing and selling tickets to the festival and other events.
Billy Crudup
William Gaither Crudup is an American actor. He is a four-time Tony Award nominee, winning once for his performance in Tom Stoppard's play The Coast of Utopia in 2007. He has starred in numerous high-profile films, including Without Limits, Princess Mononoke, Almost Famous, Big Fish, Mission: Impossible III, Watchmen, Public Enemies, Spotlight, Jackie, The Stanford Prison Experiment, Justice League, and Alien: Covenant, in both lead and supporting roles. He has been nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead for his performance in Jesus' Son, and received two Screen Actors Guild Award nominations as part of an ensemble cast for Almost Famous and Spotlight, winning for the latter.
Billy Bush
William Hall Bush is an American radio and television host, and a member of the Bush family, George H. W. Bush being his uncle.
Billy Joe Saunders
Billy Joe Saunders is an English professional boxer. He has held world championships in two weight classes, including the WBO super-middleweight title since 2019, and previously the WBO middleweight title from 2015 to 2018. Saunders is the first boxer from the Travelling community to become a two-weight world champion. At regional level he held the European, British, and Commonwealth middleweight titles between 2012 and 2015. Saunders represented Great Britain at the 2008 Olympics as an amateur, reaching the second round of the welterweight bracket. In the same year, he won gold at the EU Championships.
Billy Zane
William George Zane Jr. is an American actor.
Billy Joel
William Martin Joel is an American musician, singer-songwriter, and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Piano Man" after his first major hit and signature song of the same name, he has led a commercially successful career as a solo artist since the 1970s, having released 12 studio albums from 1971 to 1993 as well as one studio album in 2001. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, as well as the sixth best-selling recording artist and the third best-selling solo artist in the United States, with over 150 million records sold worldwide. His 1985 compilation album, Greatest Hits Vol. 1 & 2, is one of the best-selling albums in the US.
Billy Quarantillo
Billy Quarantillo is an American mixed martial artist who currently competes in the Featherweight division of the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He was the former King of the Cage Lightweight Champion.
Billy Ray Cyrus
Billy Ray Cyrus is an American singer-songwriter and actor. He has released 16 studio albums and 53 singles since 1992, and is known for his hit single "Achy Breaky Heart", which topped the U.S. Hot Country Songs chart and became the first single ever to achieve triple platinum status in Australia. It was also the best-selling single in the same country in 1992. Due to the song's music video, the line dance rose in popularity.
Billy Idol
William Michael Albert Broad, known professionally as Billy Idol, is an English musician, singer, songwriter, and actor who holds dual British and American citizenship. He first achieved fame in the 1970s emerging from the London punk rock scene as the lead singer of a band called Generation X. Subsequently, he embarked on a solo career which led to international recognition and made Idol a lead artist during the MTV-driven "Second British Invasion" in the United States. The name "Billy Idol" was inspired by a schoolteacher's description of him as "idle".
Billy Eppler
Billy Eppler is an American baseball executive. He works for William Morris Endeavor. He was the general manager of the Los Angeles Angels of Major League Baseball (MLB) from 2015 to 2020. He previously served as the New York Yankees' director of professional scouting and assistant general manager.
Billy Gilman
William Wendell Gilman III is an American singer. Starting as a young country artist, he is known for his debut single "One Voice", a top 40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 and a top 20 hit on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in 2000. He has released five albums, including three for Epic Nashville. In 2016, Gilman auditioned for season 11 of the US edition of The Voice and competed as part of Team Adam Levine, finishing as runner-up for the season.
Billy Eichner
Billy Eichner is an American comedian, actor, and producer. He is the star, executive producer, and creator of Funny Or Die's Billy on the Street, a comedy game show that aired on truTV. Eichner was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for "Outstanding Game Show Host" in 2013. He is also known for playing Craig Middlebrooks on the sitcom Parks and Recreation and Timon in the 2019 remake of The Lion King.
Billy Dee Williams
William December "Billy Dee" Williams Jr. is an American actor, voice actor, and artist. He is best known as Lando Calrissian in the Star Wars franchise, first in the early 1980s, and nearly forty years later in The Rise of Skywalker (2019), marking one of the longest intervals between onscreen portrayals of a character by the same actor in American film history.
Billy Gilmour
Billy Clifford Gilmour is a Scottish professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Norwich City, on loan from fellow Premier League club Chelsea, and the Scotland national team.