Gavin & Stacey star Joanna Page has revealed she feared something “really, really bad” had happened when show creator Ruth Jones tried getting in touch over the beloved sitcom’s return.
The show is back for a much-anticipated Christmas special, almost a decade since viewers waved goodbye to the show.
Page and Jones will be joined in the festive episode by co-creator James Corden and stars Mathew Horne, Rob Brydon, Larry Lamb, Melanie Walters and Alison Steadman.
Jones and Corden – who kept the sitcom’s return a closely guarded secret while working on the script – told the cast of the comeback one by one.
However Page – who has three children under the age of seven – revealed the barrage of messages from Jones had her fearing the worst.
She said: “Ruth just got in touch with me on like every form of social media, email, message – everything. And I’m not very good at getting back in touch with people, I’m terrible, absolutely terrible.
“And so I didn’t respond for a bit because I was busy with the kids and everything, and then I suddenly thought, ‘My God, she’s WhatsApped me, emailed me, texted me and phoned me’ and she said, ‘you need to speak to me, I need to talk to you about something’.
“And my first thought was – and bear in mind this is from like a mum of three children who’s looking after three children all the time – ‘this is either something really, really good, is the show coming back? Or something really, really bad’.”
Thankfully for Page, it was the former and Jones told her the sitcom was making a comeback.
However, Gavin & Stacey’s return to TV has not been entirely without controversy.
The BBC has been forced to defend the decision to use the uncensored version of The Pogues’s classic Christmas song Fairytale Of New York in the festival special.
The episode features the cast singing along to the track, which includes the homophobic slur “faggot”.
LGBT campaigner Peter Tatchell told The Times newspaper the move would “send completely the wrong signal” and “give comfort to homophobes everywhere”.
However, the BBC backed Corden and Jones’s decision to include the lyric and a spokesperson told the Metro: “Fairytale of New York is a very popular, much-loved Christmas song played widely throughout the festive season, and the lyrics are well-established with the audience.”
The Gavin & Stacey Christmas special will air on BBC One at 8:30pm.