Fans noticed the similarities between the two jokes after a viral tweet.
James Corden has said that he “inadvertently” told a joke that had originally been performed by Ricky Gervais after a viral tweet pointed out their similarities.
Corden told the joke during his monologue on the Late Late Show earlier this week, but Rupert Myers noticed it was very similar to one told by Ricky Gervais in his Humanity show.
Sharing a comparison video to Twitter, he wrote: “In which James Corden basically does a Ricky Gervais joke word for word.”
Ricky Gervais re-tweeted the video before subsequently deleting it. He also told a fan that he thinks one of the show’s writers came up with the joke for him.
In which James Corden basically does a Ricky Gervais joke word for word pic.twitter.com/8MfkrBo8Y0
— Rupert Myers (@RupertMyers) November 1, 2022
“I doubt he would knowingly just copy such a famous stand up routine word for word like that,” he wrote.
He also said that the reason he deleted the original tweet was because he began to feel sorry for James.
Addressing the video, Corden wrote that he did not know it was a Gervais joke.
He tweeted: “Inadvertently told a brilliant Ricky Gervais joke on the show last night, obviously not knowing it came from him. It’s brilliant, because it’s a Ricky Gervais joke. You can watch all Ricky’s excellent specials on Netflix. J x.”
Inadvertently told a brilliant Ricky Gervais joke on the show last night, obviously not knowing it came from him. It’s brilliant, because it’s a Ricky Gervais joke. You can watch all Ricky’s excellent specials on Netflix. J x
— The Late Late Show with James Corden (@latelateshow) November 1, 2022
Ricky then retweeted James’ tweet acknowledging the issue.
James Corden recently received backlash for allegedly abusing the staff at the NYC restaurant Balthazar. His behaviour resulted in him being temporarily barred from the establishment, but the ban was rescinded after James called the owner to apologise.
He also addressed the incident in one of his monologues.
“As some of you may have seen last week there were stories about me being banned from a restaurant,” he said.
“Whenever these sorts of moments come my way, I like to adopt quite a British attitude of sort of keep calm and carry on.
“Things are going to get written about me. ‘Never complain, never explain’ – it’s very much my motto.
“But as my dad pointed out to me on Saturday, he said, ‘Son, well, you did complain. So you might need to explain.’ When you make a mistake, you got to take responsibility.”
