Ricky Gervais has reacted to James Corden copying a joke of his word for word on The Late Late Show.
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On Tuesday, the British comedian, who currently lives in Los Angeles, went viral after fans noticed he had used a joke Ricky had told about guitar lessons in his 2018 special Humanity during the show's monologue on Monday night.
James Corden told Ricky Gervais' joke word for word
In a Tweet, which he has since deleted because "he felt sorry for him [James]", Ricky sarcastically joked: "[James'] bit about the town square advert for guitar lessons is brilliant."
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Replying to another fan, Ricky revealed that James had not asked permission to use his joke, adding: "I reckon one of the writers 'came up with it' for him. I doubt he would knowingly just copy such a famous stand up routine word for word like that."
James Corden has said he didn't know the joke was Ricky's
Later in the day, James apologised via the show's official Twitter account, telling his fans: "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."
Ricky didn't respond to the apology, but liked the tweet. He also later retweeted a message from a from which included a clip of him giving Jimmy Fallon monologue tips.
"When @rickygervais crashed @jimmyfallon's monologue – 'Do it like you were clever enough to come up with this joke yourself!'" Ricky's fan captioned the post.
James has been in the news recently after he was banned from a restaurant for being rude to the staff.
Ricky has said he feels "sorry" for the fellow comedian
A week later, he addressed the drama surrounding his ban from NYC restaurant Balthazar on his show.
"Last week, there were stories about me being banned from a restaurant. And at the time I considered, you know, tweeting about it or Instagramming about it," the 44-year-old explained at the top of the show.
"Whenever these moments come my way, I like to adopt quite a British attitude of 'Keep calm and carry on.'"
But he said that his father—who was sitting in the audience with James' mother — told him over the weekend, "Son, well, you did complain, so you might need to explain."
James admitted that "when you make a mistake, you've got to take responsibility" and told the audience that earlier this month, while he was dining with friends at the trendy downtown eatery — one of his "absolute favorite restaurants" — his wife, Julia Carey, was served food that "she was allergic to," despite explaining her serious sensitivities to their server.