His plays included the classic Billy Liar and highly acclaimed Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell, winner of the Evening Standard Awards Comedy of the Year 1990.

He wrote sixteen novels, including Our Song, which was shortlisted for the Sunday Express Book of the Year Award, and Bimbo. His non-fiction works included two acclaimed volumes of autobiography, City Lights: A Street Life and Streets Ahead, and The Theory and Practice of Lunch, and Waterhouse on Newspaper Style.

Keith was also a hugely popular newspaper and magazine columnist, retiring from his Daily Mail and Saga magazine columns only shortly before his death in September 2009.