This weekend’s episode of Saturday Night Takeaway featured a very special reunion for fans of 2000s, as Ant and Dec teamed up with Cat Deeley to bring back Chums for one night only.
Yes, while the rest of the world gets excited about the long-awaited Friends reunion, millions around the UK got what they really wanted on Saturday night, as Cat joined Ant and Dec for a special episode of Chums, the parody sitcom they starred in throughout their time presenting SM:TV Live together.
It’s been almost 20 years since Ant and Dec stepped down from SM:TV, but the trio slipped back right into things, with Cat joking early on: “[If Dec and I hadn’t got married in the Chums finale], you’d probably have wasted your whole life childishly pratting about with Ant while I went to America and became a big star.”
Like all good episodes of Chums, the one-off revival on Saturday Night Takeaway featured heavy doses of overacting, plenty of innuendo and, of course, those infamous “snog interruptions”.
There was also no end of celebrity guests, including a number from those glory days of SM:TV like Steps and Brian McFadden.
Also taking part were comedians Joe Lycett and Emily Atack, daytime stars Ruth Langsford and Eamonn Holmes and, for some reason, Sting and Simon Pegg, who appeared via video-link.
True to form, the sketch also ended on a cliffhanger “freezeframe” ending, with a voiceover joking: “Find out what happens in the next episode of Chums… in 2041.”
Ant and Dec previously teased they’d be trying to get Cat involved in an SM:TV reunion on Saturday Night Takeaway last month, saying: “We’ve been close a couple of times. We’re always talking to Cat [Deeley] anyway. Maybe something will happen at some point.
“We’re talking about Cat maybe coming on Saturday Night Takeaway, and maybe doing something... this year.”
On Boxing Day last year, Ant, Dec and Cat took part in the documentary The Story Of SM:TV Live, which looked back at some of the live Saturday morning show’s highlights.
The trio had previously been planning something for SM:TV’s 20th anniversary in 2018, prior to Ant McPartlin’s arrest for drink-driving, after which he took some time out from the spotlight to focus on his recovery.
Watch the 10-minute Chums reunion episode in the video above.