Gavin & Stacey 'to return'

Another Christmas special reportedly in the works

Gavin & Stacey is to return for another BBC One Christmas Special, it has been reported.

Deadline says creators James Corden and Ruth Jones are writing a script, with the episode currently in pre-production with makers Baby Cow.

It will pick up from the 2019 Christmas special – which attracted a mammoth 18 million viewers – to chart what happened after Nessa (Jones) proposed to Smithy (Corden).

Deadline says that most of the main cast are expected to return for the special, which will be filmed this summer The ensemble also includes Mathew Horne, Joanna Page, Rob Brydon, Alison Steadman, Larry Lamb and Julia Davis.

In September, Corden dampened speculation about a return to the show, saying: ‘I genuinely don’t know if we’ll ever do another one. I think Ruth and I would love to make something together again… I really don’t know with Gavin & Stacey. I think we feel so proud of that last special…

‘I think, in a way, those characters, they live on, they carry on, they’re still out there somewhere living and breathing. Their lives carry on and we just sort of get together and open this portal and find out. Some people say to me, "I want to know what happens". And I go, so do I!

'I don’t know… Maybe there’s something really perfect about it ending there. Can we truly fulfil people’s ambitions for it? I know it’s such an annoying answer, I’m aware of that, but I don’t know.'

But he has previously kept the door open. In 2021 he told Radio 2: 'As it stands there aren’t any plans to do more, but that’s not to say that there isn’t the want or the inclination to do one," he told BBC Radio 2.

'When we wrote that last special we never thought whether we’d make another, but that special ends so open I think it would be a shame to leave it there. That’s certainly my feeling and I think Ruth feels the same.

'It doesn’t feel like the end of a book but the end of a chapter. If we did another that would be the end of it.'

Corden is looking for new projects since quitting his US talk show The Late, Late Show, last year. He now hosts a weekly radio show in the US, This Life of Mine on Sirius XM.

Gavin & Stacey originally ran for three seasons from 2007 to 2010.

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Published: 13 Feb 2024