Brits divided as Russell Brand joke is cut from Gavin & Stacey

Gavin and Stacey is just an absolute national treasure of British telly. There’s no doubt.

But sometimes even the most popular of jewels need a polish, and it seems the BBC have decided to make a cut to the legendary Christmas special.

And Brits are very, very divided over it.

You can watch the original lines here:

The 2007 Christmas episode of Gavin and Stacey features a little Russell Brand joke, while they all sit down for dinner at Pam and Mick’s.

Now, in case you’ve somehow managed to miss one of the biggest headlines of the last few months, both the BBC and Channel 4 have been undergoing internal investigations into allegations raised against the comedian while working on its programmes.

The Met Police also received reports of sexual offences following Brand being accused of rape, assault and emotional abuse in a joint investigation by The Sunday Times, The Times and Channel 4 Dispatches - which he denied.

As it stands, these investigations regarding the actor are currently ongoing.

BBC

It’s not known quite when it happened, but it’s possible the Gavin and Stacey quip about the star has been cut from the episode on iPlayer as a result.

The original joke comes as Nessa gets back from reading to Neil the baby, and Pam expects she’s been reading a ‘little fairy story’.

But obviously this is Nessa, the Welsh woman with the dragon tattoo, she’s not going to be reading a Disney story.

Instead, she reveals she’s been reading Brand’s My Booky Wook, leading to the seemingly edited out lines:

Stacey: “Did we get a mention in the end?”

Nessa: “No.”

Stacey: “I’m disappointed, are you?”

Nessa: “Don’t be Stace. We had a crackin’ night Pam, all three of us.”

X/rustyrockets

Sharing the revelation to Reddit, one user said they’re gonna have to go and ‘buy the bloody DVDs now, just so I can watch the show as it supposed to be watched’.

Others call it ‘ridiculous’ and say they should just put a ‘trigger warning’ rather than cutting the lines.

But some say it’s an ‘ongoing case’ and it’s ‘better to be safe’ by leaving it out.

And one said: “We watched it the other day and it was still there. I remember my wife saying ‘oooft that's not aged well.’”

Whereas others simply pointed out another important matter: “A bit too early to be watching the Gavin and Stacey Christmas special that’s a Christmas Eve/Christmas Day job surely!”

Well, amid all the debate, the Beeb has claimed the new version of the episode with the Russell Brand joke cut was actually added to iPlayer by accident.

A BBC spokesperson told LADbible: "This version was uploaded to BBC iPlayer in error. The original version will be on BBC iPlayer shortly."

Topics: BBC, Gavin And Stacey, Russell Brand, TV and Film, Reddit

Jess Battison

Jess is an Entertainment Journalist with a love of all things pop culture. Her main interests include keeping up with the Twitter girlies, waiting for a new series of The Traitors and losing her voice at a Beyoncé concert. She graduated with a first in Journalism from City, University of London in 2021 and has previously worked at MyLondon.

@jessbattison_