Paddy McGuinness has teased fans hoping for a return of hit show Max and Paddy’s Road to Nowhere.
The show was a hugely successful spin-off of Peter Kay’s legendary Phoenix Nights that starred McGuinness and Kay as the titular bouncers, Max and Paddy.
It aired on Channel 4 way back in 2004 and – despite what you might think – there were only ever six episodes made.
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It started in the immediate aftermath of the end of the previous sitcom, with Max and Paddy riding off into the sunset in their camper van, fearing for their lives.
That led them to a life on the road, getting into a number of hilarious scrapes along the way.
Anyway, since the show went off, there’s been much talk about getting the old band back together, either for new episodes of Phoenix Nights or Max and Paddy, and it seems as if McGuinness would entertain the idea, even if it’s not that close to fruition.
He also said that there are a number of special episodes that are already written, meaning they’d be able to start working almost immediately.
He explained: “Well, when we talk about stuff, like the interesting thing about Max and Paddy and Phoenix Nights is now, we are kind of all of an age of the people we played back then.
“But we [him and Kay] do talk about it and what have you, but, I don't, I can't, I can't see it at the minute, but we never say never, but it's good to talk.
“Max and Paddy for instance, we wrote a couple of Christmas specials, and we’ve still got them.
“We never got around to doing one for whatever the reasons were back in the day.
“But we've actually got them!”
It’s not exactly a definite, but the door is always open.
It’s not clear whether Kay would ever return to the show, given that he doesn’t seem to like coming back to projects such as this.
He’s currently in the middle of a massive tour, anyway.
He started out back in December 2022, and the Bolton comedian is playing a load of dates, including a month long residency at the O2 Arena in London.
One person who won’t be buying a ticket will be McGuinness, though.
He’s admitted that he has no interest in seeing his mate play live, even if it's his first shows in 12 years.
On BBC Radio 2 recently, the Take Me Out presenter explained: “The mad thing about this show is, he rings me up, he says, ‘I’m going on tour’.
“So my first thing is, ‘why? Why do that? Why put yourself…’ and he’s like, ‘I want to do it’, this, that and the other. Great, fair enough, each to their own, and it is very seducing when you’re on stage and people are laughing.
“So anyhow, he’s put this massive tour on, I come round for a cup of tea. So I’m round at his house, kids are out, wife’s out, it’s just me and him and a cup of tea. So he says, ‘get the laptop, I’ll talk you through stuff’.”
He continued: “And then he says, ‘I tell you what, I’ll do the show now’. So he’s in his slippers, jogging pants from George at Asda, T-shirt with bean juice down the front - it’s just him,
“I’m sat where you are to me, he’s done the full routine."
“I get most people saying, ‘what an experience’ - not for me. I’m thinking, my tea is going stone cold here. And then the ending’s amazing, it’s really extravagant, imagine that in his front room, how that played out.
“So, I’m like, I’ve seen it in HD, 4K, I don’t need to do that again - so that’s it.
“What I did when he put that tour on is literally turn my phone off, because anyone who has any attachment to him whatsoever, people come crawling out the woodwork and ask, ‘have you got any tickets?’”
Tickets are still available for some of those shows, by the way.
Just don’t expect to see Paddy there – there’s more chance of a Max and Paddy reunion than that.
Topics: UK News, TV and Film, Peter Kay, Paddy McGuinness, Celebrity, Channel 4
Tom Wood