Gavin & Stacey Friends". Corden claims to have been inspired by the story of his own real life best friend Gavin, who met his wife over the phone at work, and arranged to meet. They presented it to the BBC as a one-off play, but the BBC instead asked for a full series. The roles of Gavin and Stacey were cast through an auditioning process, but were almost immediately given to Mathew Horne and Joanna Page on the strength of their chemistry together. The roles of Nessa and Smithy were written by Corden and Jones for themselves. Some roles were written with certain
And the Band Played On he was eulogized by Cleve Jones, who said "Randy's contribution was so crucial. He broke through society's denial and was absolutely critical to communicating the reality of AIDS." Larry Kramer said of him, "He single-handedly probably did more to educate the world about AIDS than any single person." "And the Band Played On" was used as the basis for a 1993 Primetime Emmy Award-winning HBO television film of the same name. It was produced by Aaron Spelling, directed by Roger Spottiswoode, and starred Matthew Modine as epidemiologist Don Francis and Richard Masur as William Darrow at the Centers for Disease