James Corden has crossed paths with quite a few famous faces over the years (Picture: RB/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images)

From Patrick Stewart to Pierce Brosnan, James Corden has been involved in a few public spats over his time.

In a recently episode of Late Night Lycett, Mel B doubled down on her previous declaration that the Gavi & Stacey creator is the ‘biggest d***head celebrity’ she’d ever met.

Having moved to LA and broken the US TV scene with The Late Late Show with James Corden, eight years later the Cats actor announced his plans to move back to the UK, where he first made it.

After the success of Gavin and Stacey, James admitted to The New Yorker in 2020: ‘I started to behave like a brat that I just don’t think I am.’

He explained: ‘It’s so intoxicating, that first flush of fame. And I think it’s even more intoxicating if you’re not bred for it.’

With the return of James onto UK shores, and Mel B’s recent renewed criticism of him, here is a look back at his past spats with famous faces.

Mel B

Cast your minds back to December 2022, and Mel B was on Channel 4’s The Big Narstie Show and spilled all to Mo Gilligan.

‘So, there’s a few,’ Mel began, after being asked who fits the crown of the ‘biggest d***head celebrity. ‘James Corden, Geri Halliwell, Jessie J and me!’

Shocked by the mention of a bandmate, Mo replied: ‘But Geri, she’s your bandmate?’

‘I know, I love her to bits but she’s really f*cking annoying,’ Mel admitted.

Picking up on the mention of Gavin and Stacey actor James, Big Narstie probed: ‘You said James Corden, what did he do?’

‘I think you always have to be nice to the people that you work with whether it be production, camera guys, sound, lighting – we all work for the same thing,’ she responded.

‘So, you should always be nice and he hasn’t been very nice.’

This came just after James’ Balthazar restaurant controversy.

Sir Patrick Stewart

This is perhaps one of the most cringe moments on the list, and it came at the Glamour Women of the Year Awards in 2010.

Corden was hosting the ceremony, and when Sir Patrick took to the stage to present an award he deeply criticised the comic’s MC style.

‘When the presenters are up here and when the recipients are receiving their awards, don’t stand at the back of the stage with your hands in your pockets looking around as though you wished you were anywhere but here,’ he said into the mic to James.

‘Oh, you couldn’t be more wrong, Sir,’ responded James defensively. ‘You couldn’t be more wrong. If it looked like that, I’m so sorry. But when you come up to present an award, just f***ing get on with it.’

What ensued was some fat-shaming by the X-Men star.

‘From where I was sitting I could see your belly,’ the Star Trek actor continued, ‘and that was night over there at the back of the room.’

‘Sorry I’m waiting for the punchline, go on. No, seriously, go on,’ said James, getting into Sir Patrick’s face, and claiming the whole room was watching him ‘dying’ on stage.

‘One more,’ Sir Patrick continued (please, no!) before his bizarre next words: ‘If you fancy the Jonas Brothers, cover your belly.’ Okay…

Later in the evening James then showed the crowd his stomach, and made more jibes at ‘the old man’ Sir Patrick, who he suggested should go home in a taxi.

Pierce Brosnan

While Pierce Brosnan has never talked about James in public, the comedian once dubbed the James Bond star, 70, ‘f***ing rude’.

James sat down with Khloe Kardashian for a game of Spill Your Guts Or Fill Your Guts in 2017.

The game rules are that guests have to answer a tricky question, or eat something gross – in this case, bird saliva.

Khloe asked James: ‘Name a celebrity who has been rude to you at a party.’

James was initially hesitant to spill the beans, as he replied: ‘There was someone. But I don’t know if we’re going to try and book him on the show. I don’t know if I can drink it.’

Khloe responded with a blunt, ‘screw him and tell us the name,’ to which James fessed up.

‘Pierce Brosnan. I don’t think he’s a rude man, he just happened to be [to me]. I went to see U2 and I was there with my friend Louis and his wife, and my wife, and Pierce Brosnan was with some friends and they left halfway through the gig to go off, and we left the space [for them].

James previously said the success of Gavin & Stacey went to his head (Picture: BABY COW)

‘And then they had been gone quite a long time and Bono was like right there on this sort of big runway in the middle of the show.

‘So me and my wife moved into this area, and literally, I’ve never felt anything like it, this arm went on here and just pushed me out the way. And I looked at him, and he didn’t even glance at me and he just moved back into his area.’

When Khloe suggested that Pierce might have just been a bit merry that night, James said: ‘Maybe he’s just a bit f*****g rude.’

Restaurant-gate

Last year James was briefly barred from a Balthazar restaurant in New York for being ‘extremely nasty’ to staff, according to the owner, Keith McNally.

McNally posted about the incident – involving an omelet – on social media which prompted calls for the comedian to be ‘banned’ from other venues after a strong backlash.

McNally wrote: ‘James Corden is a hugely gifted comedian, but a tiny Cretin of a man. And the most abusive customer to my Balthazar servers since the restaurant opened 25 years ago.’ 

James later addressed the incident during an episode of The Late Late Show and said it was ‘never my intention’ to upset staff – but acknowledged he had been ‘ungracious’.

Manhattan owner McNally later said Corden rang him and ‘apologised profusely’ – but in an interview with New York Times the Carpool Karaoke star later called the whole thing ‘silly’ and claimed he did nothing wrong.

Ricky Gervais

Both Ricky and James have fired shots at one another over the years in the name of comedy.

While Ricky assured The Sun in 2020 their jokes are ‘friendly teasing’ and ‘all fun’ – they have got a definite history of jibing each other.

Last year, Ricky and James hit headlines when James did a monologue about Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover that was very similar to one of Ricky’s routines from his Humanity special.

The After Life creator referencing it in a now-deleted tweet, which, alongside the since-removed clip, said: ‘The bit about the town square advert for guitar lessons is brilliant’.

He was referencing his own joke, which is almost identical to the one James had told.

James was met with fierce backlash and later claimed the joke was copied ‘inadvertently’ without realising where it originated.

Indeed, Ricky didn’t harbour any bad feelings, and thought there was ‘no way’ James ‘knowingly’ ripped off the joke.

‘So that is clearly my routine but I don’t think he came up with it at all. I think a writer pitched that to him and didn’t tell him it was mine, or the writer forgot,’ Ricky explained.

Ricky Gervais and James have exchanged a few heated jokes over the years (Picture: Rob Latour/Variety/Penske Media via Getty Images)

‘I don’t know. I want to be fair. But what I don’t believe is James Corden watched that and thought “I can just rip that off”. There’s just no way. There is no way James Corden watched that and thought “I can get away with this.”‘

‘It was the biggest special of the year. There is no way he thought “I can rip him off”. He was horrified. No chance.’

After the restaurant controversy, Ricky chimed in with a Tweet featuring a scene from his Netflix show After Life, where Kath discusses her dream dinner guests.

When she listed Corden as one, Gervais’ character Tony Johnson, replied,”f**k me,” in disgust.

Alongside the clip, Ricky’s caption read: ‘James f**king Corden. AfterLife @rickygervais. Worst. Dinner party. Ever.’

In 2009 James parodied Ricky’s The Office character David Brent in his sketch show Horne and Corden.

Costar Matthew Horne – who once refused to be interviewed with him – later revealed on Never Mind The Buzzcocks that he reigned in James’ performances because the comic had ‘taken it too far’.

In his 2020 Golden Globes speech – in which Ricky savaged the whole of Hollywood – he said: ‘The world got to see James Corden as a fat pussy. He was also in the movie Cats, but no one saw that.’

Ricky, king of controversial jokes, also once criticised James’ gag about Harvey Weinstein.

James was hosting an amFar charity dinner when he said: ‘It’s a beautiful night here in L.A., so beautiful, Harvey Weinstein has already asked tonight up to his hotel to give him a massage.’

‘When you do a contentious joke or talk about a taboo subject, it’s got to be a great joke,’ Ricky said on Radio Andy. ‘You can’t just bounce out there and do jokes about abuse and rape. You’ve got to be very intelligent when you do it.

‘There’s got to be a point to it. He did it like it was light entertainment. He didn’t do it well enough.’

Corden later apologised for the joke.

Bill Maher

Back in 2019, Bill, host of Real Time with Bill Maher, joked about obesity, saying being fat ‘isn’t a birth defect’ and no one ‘comes out the womb needing to buy two seats on the airplane.’

He continued: ‘Fat-shaming doesn’t need to end, it needs to make a comeback.’

In response, James took to his Late Late Show and fired shots at the host, admitting he’d struggled his whole life with managing his weight.

‘We’re not all as lucky as Bill Maher, you know? We don’t all have a sense of superiority that burns 35,000 calories a day,’ hesaid.

‘In the meantime, Bill, while you’re encouraging people to think about what goes into their mouths,’ James concluded, ‘just think a little harder about what comes out of yours.’

Got a story?

If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us [email protected], calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.

MORE : Mel B proudly owns calling British comic the ‘biggest d***head celebrity’ out there

MORE : Brit Awards host steps down after two years

He’s crossed paths with many stars over the years.