Feuds, jealousy and a dodgy ‘fling’: Why Inbetweeners reunion is off

They were the sitcom sixth-formers whose crude antics and hapless quests to lose their virginities had Channel 4 audiences in hysterics.

And now, ten years after the stars of The Inbetweeners were last on set for the second movie the series spawned, fans had hoped rumours of a lucrative new film deal could reunite Simon, Jay, Neil and Will.

But I can reveal that – despite playing such tight-knit on-screen friends – actors Joe Thomas, James Buckley, Blake Harrison and Simon Bird, are a world away from their characters in real life, with bitter rivalries dashing any hopes of a reunion.

In fact, one source said: ‘Weirdly, none of them are really mates and they haven’t been for a few years.

‘Fans all like to think that they’re best pals in real life but Simon Bird [who played briefcase-carrying geek Will] and Blake Harrison [nice-but-dim Neil] are mega snooty.’

Bird was forced to disappoint fans this week when he confirmed there was ‘no prospect’ of the stars making a comeback.

In an interview following reports of a third film in the pipeline, the 40-year-old said: ‘I’m afraid to be the one pouring cold water on this but it’s not happening.’

But while the actor went on to explain that the busy diaries of the show’s leading lights were to blame, industry insiders believe that scheduling is only part of the reason. One joked: ‘There’s as much chance of a comeback for The Beatles.’

Because, like many groups of teenage friends, the actors have ‘grown apart over time’, the source said, amid jealousy over their respective careers in which some have achieved greater success than others.

The source added: ‘Of course there have been a few cross words shared between them over the years, but there has never been one big barney.

‘The truth is, they all have long-term partners. The boys are all dads now and they have moved on with their lives.’

And there are further clashes with other members of the cast, including rumoured bad feeling between Emily Atack, who played the boys’ school crush Charlotte, and Buckley, who played foul-mouthed Jay.

The pair are said to have had a behind-the-scenes fling, but the relationship soured.

It has been reported that this led to Atack – who will next month star in Rivals, the much anticipated Disney+ series based on the Jilly Cooper bonkbuster – being axed from a reunion show Fwends Reunited on Channel 4 in 2019.

Coining an Inbetweeners catchphrase, in which Jay is mocked by the other boys for making a new ‘fwend’, the show didn’t feature Atack because Buckley reportedly told producers: ‘It’s her or me.’

Sources say the brief romance ‘was nothing but a bit of fun’ to Atack, who has always played it down to friends and was disappointed to find he may have used his clout to have her dropped from the comeback.

An insider adds: ‘She was gutted. She didn’t see it as a big deal, it was a bit of fun years ago and they’ve all moved on, but he clearly harbours some sort of grudge.

‘He made it very clear that he wouldn’t share a set with her again in any form. It’s just yet another issue.’

The Inbetweeners took Britain by storm in the late Noughties as a coming-of-age comedy that ­followed the lives of the four ­suburban teenagers as they endured life at the fictional Rudge Park Comprehensive. A film followed in 2011 and a sequel in 2014.

It seems a decade is a long time in showbusiness because I’m told another major factor stopping them reuniting is that the foursome are embarrassed their juvenile antics on the show may damage their future careers.

A source said: ‘It’s James Buckley who wrestles with it the most.

‘He’s the one who most wants to cling on to the show and would be most up for a reunion, but is also the most embarrassed by what people think of him because of it.’

Which is hardly surprising given Jay’s crude descriptions of his imagined sexual conquests, videos of which are still shared widely online.

The source added: ‘People seem to still talk to him as if he’s Jay from The Inbetweeners, and sometimes he plays up to it and then at other times he has real crises of confidence and panics that the public think he really is an idiot.

‘Either way he hasn’t managed to shake it off and move on from the show quite like the others have.’

Buckley, who married former glamour model Clair Meek in 2012, continues to run a podcast titled Completed It Mate – one of his character’s catchphrases – and has made more than £1 million on celebrity video website Cameo by recording expletive-filled clips for his paying fans.

It’s a far cry from his co-stars, who have gone on to enjoy significant acting success away from the show.

Harrison went on to appear alongside Hugh Grant and Ben Whishaw in acclaimed drama A Very English Scandal, with ­Catherine Zeta-Jones in a film remake of classic sitcom Dad’s Army, and with Billie Piper in Sky hit I Hate Suzie.

Bird has become an in-demand director and producer, as well as starring in popular sitcom Friday Night Dinner, while Thomas, who played Simon, has appeared in comedy dramas Fresh Meat and White Gold, alongside stage performances, including his own show at the Edinburgh Festival.

The four’s last get-together was for Fwends Reunited, the reunion show hosted by the acerbic Jimmy Carr who Buckley later said teased them relentlessly.

He explained: ‘It became a thing that wasn’t a celebration of this good thing I did in my life, it was me being taken the p*** out of for hours on end.

‘I didn’t have the personality or the intelligence to cope with it, especially when you’re up against someone like Jimmy Carr, who’s super quick and super funny. So I come across as a complete moron through the whole thing.’ 

He revealed that he felt conflicted between playing up to his character and speaking as his real self: ‘I got caught in this spot between Jay and myself where I was going, ‘You’re acting like a f***ing idiot, you’re being a moron, you’re being a d***.’ ‘

It was only a fear of being a ‘stick in the mud’, he said, that meant he kept going: ‘I didn’t want to go, ‘Can we stop for a second because I don’t know what the f***’s going on here – you’re talking to me like I’m Jay from The Inbetweeners. I’m really not’.’

No wonder the show was widely panned, with one viewer criticising the cast ‘who looked like they didn’t want to be there’.

In short, the four lads – as is frequently the case in real life – have grown up and grown apart.

‘They don’t want to keep harking back to the past,’ a source says. ‘They want to remember The Inbetweeners for what it was, a bit of fun when they were young.

‘Despite the big-money offers there is no way the four of them will be donning those school uniforms again.’