A Ricky Gervais superfan has revealed how he landed a role on After Life with the help of social media.
Cole Anderson-James, 24, was a full-time salesman in a "boring nine-to-five job" but was noticed by Gervais after making TikToks based on The Office and other comedies. He then reached out to the comedian to ask for a job.
Read more: Ricky Gervais' After Life: The meaning of the final scene which has got everyone crying.
Cole told BBC Radio 1 Newsbeat.: "It's crazy. I've been a fan of Ricky Gervais for over 10 years - I even go to sleep with his podcast on in the background!"
Cole downloaded the TikTok app to combat boredom during lockdown. He began recreating scenes from The Office and other comedies. The videos were noticed by Ricky Gervais after Cole shared them on Twitter. After Gervais followed him, Cole decided to reach out. In a direct message, Cole said: "On the premise you don't ask, you don't get, I don't suppose there's any cameo roles going in After Life?"
At first, Cole thought he would not hear back from his hero. He told the BBC: "Months went past and I didn't hear anything. I thought 'it's not happening', and then I got an email saying 'audition for After Life [season] 3' and my head exploded."
Cole then had a Zoom call with Gervais and the show's producers but was told there was no role for him. Eventually, he was cast as a yoga teacher.
On the show, Cole's character teaches laughter yoga, a real exercise involving prolonged forced laughter. His scene involves seven extras alongside main character Cath, who is played by Diane Morgan.
Cole told the BBC "I learned the script the night before [filming]. Ricky was like, 'let's just film it and see what happens… Go loosely on the script, just make it all up'. That threw me off. When he [Gervais] said 'action!', my heart just dropped. I did mess it up a little in the first one, but we did it another billion times so it was alright."
Cole urges anyone who has the opportunity to reach out like he did. He said "I did shoot my shot".
Speaking about his success on TikTok, Cole told inews: "TikTok is amazing because you can have zero followers and still get a million views.
"If your content is good and you’re being consistent and uploading something every two days, the algorithm will push it to others. On YouTube and Instagram you need the followers first, but luckily it’s worked for me on Twitter as well."
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