Steve Coogan has revealed that his cult comedy creation Alan Partridge will be returning to the BBC for a new series.
The comedian, actor and writer appeared on BBC One’s The One Show yesterday (June 9), during which he broke the news.
“Alan will be back on the BBC early next year, there will be a lot of Alan on TV next year,” he told hosts Alex Jones and Amol Rajan.
When pressed for further details on the new show, Coogan responded: “I’m trying to do a leak to the press about it. He’ll just be back on a show, it might be a bit like this. I’m here to do research.”
As Manchester Evening News reports, Jones then commented the presenters could be his “inspiration”. “That’s one way of putting it,” the star replied.
- Read more: ‘Have I got a second series?’: The best Political Partridge moments from the general election
Coogan also said: “Alan feels he could have invented the One Show and been its main anchor over the years.”
He also discussed creating the character alongside co-writers Neil and Rob Gibbons. “He is in some ways like a real person because when you write him, you feel like there is a fourth person in the room,” he said.
“I quite like Alan even though he’s an idiot. But eventually you want to go away and leave him alone. It’s like a relative you don’t mind seeing at Christmas but you would’t want to live with.”
Partridge has been the focus of three TV series – the spoof chat show Knowing Me, Knowing You, I’m Alan Partridge, which followed him as he tried to advance his career and later bounce back, and Mid Morning Matters, which centred around his life at fictional radio station North Norfolk Digital.
In 2013, the character was also at the heart of the film Alan Partridge, Alpha Papa, which saw him caught up in a radio station seige.