Born in a small rural town in North Carolina, Bill Bailey began his itinerant life after graduating from university with a degree in philosophy and a keen interest in judo. After being drafted and subsequently ejected by the US Army for being "incompatible," he found work as a prison guard in Canada and continued his study of judo before briefly prospecting for gold in British Columbia. Having meanwhile accidentally married a Texan heiress, he moved to Houston, Texas where he managed a ranch, scrambled motorbikes, rallied sports cars, worked as a bouncer, taught English and French and organised the first white collar union in the US meat-packing industry. He placed third in the Southwestern US Judo Championships (light-heavyweight division) and was awarded his black belt. Backing quickly away from Texas after stumbling into the acting profession he moved to London. Within a year of his arrival he became the first full-frontal male nude on the British stage and, consequently, was featured in a full page photo in Life Magazine opposite Lennon and Ono. In the course of his acting career he has worked extensively in film - in Hollywood and Europe - television, and London's West End. During the Miners' Strike of '84-'85 Bill wrote a play about the strike and toured the embattled coalfields performing with a small company of actors.

He is the published author of five novels called The Haug Quintet, an investigation of the political nature of consciousness set in a compelling fictional landscape.