The actor, 54, and James, 35, were pictured in Rome in 2020 appearing to be on very familiar terms as they squeezed onto a scooter together for a sightseeing trip, before stopping at a pavement table for a cosy lunch.
Just 24 hours later, West had flown home to the UK to see his wife, Catherine FitzGerald, and staged a kiss for the cameras outside their family home with a note that insisted: “Our marriage is strong.”
Speaking about the aftermath now, he said: “I hesitate to speak on my wife’s behalf because obviously it was horrible, particularly for her.
“But we do joke about it sometimes. Because whenever we went out together, the papers would always say we were ‘putting on a show of unity’. Even if we’d just been rowing about parking the car or whatever, even if that couldn’t be further from the truth.
“And so when we go out, we do sort of say, ‘Shall we go and have a show of unity up in London?’…That was the best that came out of it, really.”
The actor, who is starring in A View from the Bridge at the Theatre Royal Haymarket until August, also said his wife teases him for not being “very convincing” when playing upper class roles.
West said: “My wife, who is genuinely upper class, always tells me, ‘You’re much better in the working-class parts, you’re not very good as upper class, you’re not convincing at all.”
“Some people look good in stiff collars but I’m not one of them. I understand upper-class ways, and I like those characters, but as an outsider,” he added.
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