IT is one of the most talked about TV comebacks in decades – and will dominate the ratings war on Christmas Day.
But devoted fans who have been waiting for Gavin & Stacey to return since 2010 nearly had their hopes scuppered by writer’s block.
James Corden, 41, and Ruth Jones, 53, met in secret to work on a new script at his home in Los Angeles.
But after taking a week off from hosting The Late, Late Show to discuss ideas and storylines, they realised what they had written was not good enough.
Speaking exclusively to The Sun in LA, dad-of-three James said: “In a 24-hour period the show was dead — then brought back to life.
“It was deeply depressing. It was the second time Ruth had flown out. That’s a long way to go. I was working on my days off, so that is essentially time you’re not with your children.
“We wrote the majority during a hiatus week from The Late, Late Show. I finished work on the Thursday and people were saying, ‘Ooh, I’m off skiing’, or ‘Oh I’m doing nothing, I’m just going to potter around’.
RESCUED PROJECT
“And you go, ‘Well yeah, I’ll be in a room trying to see if there’s anything there in a world we created 15 years ago’.
“There was a very real moment where we had written maybe 40 pages. We recorded it just to see how long it was and we both knew probably halfway through, but we soldiered on.
“And we both finished, and Ruth went, ‘What do you think?’ And I said, ‘We haven’t got it. It just doesn’t feel like Gavin & Stacey’.
“We decided, ‘OK, well, thank goodness we didn’t tell anyone. Thank the Lord we didn’t. We’ve scratched this itch that we thought was there, and it isn’t, so no harm done. No one will ever know’.”
But after he “moped around the house” James and Ruth agreed to hold a “post-mortem” about why it hadn’t worked.
And thankfully for die-hard fans and the writers themselves, an idea “landed in the room” and rescued the whole project.
James said: “It’s probably the quickest scene we’ve ever written. And I think it’s the best scene Gavin & Stacey has ever had.
“Suddenly this scene arrived, I can’t tell you, I sound like Mystic Meg, but it landed in the room.”
The turnaround began a process which brings us to the Christmas Day special, starting with a call to the BBC’s director of content Charlotte Moore, who bit their hands off at the offer of a comeback.
James said: “I sent her an email saying, ‘Can I speak to you tomorrow?’ I didn’t want to call the office line.
It’s probably the quickest scene we’ve ever written, I think it’s the best scene Gavin & Stacey has ever had
James Corden
“I said, ‘Can I call you on your mobile?’ I put her on speaker phone and said, ‘Hey, how are you? Sorry for the cloak-and-dagger stuff. I’m sat with Ruth Jones’, and she gasped.
“I said, ‘We haven’t spoken to the cast, but if we can figure it out would it be something you’d be interested in?’”
The prospect of a Gavin & Stacey reboot has been mooted constantly since the last episode went out on New Year’s Day in 2010, when more than ten million people tuned in.
James and Ruth’s characters Smithy and Nessa were seemingly a happy couple living in Barry, while Gavin and Stacey, played by Mathew Horne and Joanna Page, were expecting their first child.
Fast forward a decade in the new one and Gavin and Stacey are coping with parenthood and — without dropping any spoilers — there’s still something of a spark between Smithy and Nessa.
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And James, who will be watching the episode in England with his family, ranks these final efforts as one of the best episodes he and Ruth have written.
He said: “It has to be, really. What’s incredible about the show is that it has continued to live on in people’s lives.
“Almost every day I get a message, or when I’m at home people say, ‘Will there be any more?’
“So we knew we had to try. You never set out to make anything bad, sometimes you miss the mark, but this felt so precious that there was no room for error.
“I hope people can feel it or see it when they watch it but it’s been such a labour of love. We wanted to make a show that’s worthy of the love and affection the show gets, the prospect of ruining that is so great.
HOW IT ENDED LAST TIME
WHEN the third and final series of Gavin & Stacey came to an end in 2010, more than 10.2million of us tuned in.
In the show Stacey revealed she was expecting Gavin’s baby. The couple had been having fertility issues and after hearing the news Gavin proudly proclaimed: “My balls work!”
They celebrated the happy news just before Nessa was due to tie the knot with her on-off partner Dave Coaches.
But in the dying moments Smithy burst into the church and begged Nessa, mum of their son Neil, to reconsider.
Nessa, who was caught in two minds, finally decided to call off the wedding for good.
Dave admitted he realised Nessa never really loved him and as he left the church he told her: “It’s been a blast, sugar t*ts.”
The episode cut to six months later and the last thing fans saw was Gavin, Stacey, Nessa and Smithy laughing and joking by the Barry Island seaside.
“We couldn’t ever embark on anything unless we thought this is a story we can tell and it serves the characters and audience. It was such a rollercoaster writing it together. I already look at it with such fondness.”
But while the show’s comeback is all anyone in the UK will be watching on Christmas Day, its reception in the US — where James lives with his wife Julia and their kids — is very different.
He added: “I don’t bump into people who ask me about Gavin & Stacey every day. It’s weird that everyone back home (in Britain) is so excited.
“It’s hard for me to gauge, I feel so far away from it. We’ve made this show, I just want people to enjoy it and I hope they do. I hope generations of families will sit down together and enjoy it for many different reasons.”
When the series first aired in 2007 it was shown on BBC Three. But as its ratings grew and grew, it transferred to a primetime slot on BBC1.
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But with BBC Three now just an online station, I ask James whether the show would even be made these days, let alone be a success.
He said: “The biggest reason we couldn’t do Gavin & Stacey now is because it’s inconceivable that you would go on a blind date with someone and meet them in Leicester Square and hadn’t looked at their online profile.
“That’s how much the world has changed. That’s what I think about. They’d know who their friends are, what they were into. The entire show is about friendship and at the centre of that is mine and Ruth’s friendship.
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Mel B BANNED from taking daughter, 8, to UK for Xmas after ex slams her in court“However proud I am of the show, the thing I’m most proud of is friendship and our working relationship. Historically, with writing partnerships like mine and Ruth’s, we shouldn’t be speaking right now.
"We should have had a huge fallout. But it just hasn’t happened as it comes from a place of joy.”
- Gavin & Stacey, Christmas Day, BBC1, 8.30pm.
RUTH: WE HAD TO STAY TRUE
RUTH JONES has defended the show’s festive special for using the word “faggot” in a scene, writes Andy Halls.
In the Christmas Day comeback, Nessa, played by Ruth, and Uncle Bryn (Rob Brydon), sing a rendition of The Pogues’ Fairytale Of New York.
In the festive favourite by Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl, she sings: “You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot.”
Gay rights campaigners said the word was “pejorative” to the LGBT community and that the BBC should bleep it out.
But asked if she and co-writer James Corden had considered a backlash, Ruth said their characters had to “remain true”.
She explained: “It is a different climate. But we have to remain true to the characters, to who they were.
“Characters in Gavin & Stacey are kind and big-hearted, I believe. So I think no one is going to be intentionally hurtful. But by the same token, they’re not necessarily going to be completely politically correct or be aware of political correctness.”
The BBC argued the song is played on national and regional radio throughout Christmas.
Shane, who celebrates his 62nd birthday on Christmas Day, said last year he had “not intended to offend” with his lyrics and added: “Not all characters in songs and stories are angels.”
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