James Buckley says you couldn’t pay him to play Jay in The Inbetweeners again

‘There’s not enough money in the world for me to spoil that,’ actor said

James Buckley has said that “there’s not enough money in the world” to convince him to return to The Inbetweeners.

Airing from 2008 to 2010, the Bafta-nominated Channel 4 comedy followed a group of four teenage boys studying in a sixth form college.

Appearing on Chris Moyles’ Radio X show on Friday (14 January), Buckley said that while playing the sex-obsessed Jay Cartwright was “the best job in the world”, he had no intentions of returning to a hypothetical revival series.

“I don’t want to go near it anymore, not because I don’t think I would have an amazing time doing it, because I know I would,” he said.

“I love the boys, I love the writers. Doing The Inbetweeners was the best job in the world. All we did was muck around all day long and they filmed us doing it, and, at the end of the day, we might have had an episode... or a film or something.”

Buckley, who is currently appearing in the West End production of 2:22 A Ghost Story, continued: “But it might – you know, as I’m getting older – it’s looking like it might be the only thing that I do professionally that is universally loved. There’s not enough money in the world for me to spoil that.”

Buckley starred in The Inbetweeners alongside Simon Bird, Joe Thomas and Blake Harrison, while Greg Davies played headteacher Phil Gilbert.

From L-R: Joe Thomas, Simon Bird, James Buckley and Blake Harrison (Moviestore/Shutterstock)

In a recent interview with The Independent, Harrison – who played the dimwitted Neil Sutherland – admitted that he was “amazed” the show was still being watched and was shocked by the age of some of its fans.

“People come up to me, ‘He loves the show.’ I’m like, ‘How old is he?’ ‘He’s nine.’ I’m like, what are you doing? You’re not being a good parent,” he recalled.

“We filmed it in 2007 with series one, and the fact that 14 years later, it’s still being shown and there are still teenagers now watching it and enjoying it... that to me is really surprising.”