Buffy's James Marsters on why show would 'never have lasted' without Sarah Michelle Gellar

James Marsters, known for his role in , has given a rare glimpse into his friendship with Sarah Michelle Gellar and revealed why 'no one else would have lasted' in the role of Buffy Summers in an exclusive interview with Reach.

As fans eagerly await the reboot of the 1997 series, they will be thrilled to know that Gellar is set to return as Executive Producer, provided everything goes according to plan.

In the original series, created by Joss Whedon, Gellar portrayed the lead character Buffy Summers, a normal teenager who also had to combat vampires, demons and other dark forces.

Marsters, who was introduced in the second season as vampire Spike, quickly became a fan favourite and a central character on the show. Even after decades, the stars appear to maintain a close bond, with Marsters praising Gellar as the driving force behind Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

He expressed his admiration for her, saying: "She's amazing, by the way. I really believe that if anyone else would have played Buffy, we never would have lasted seven years.

"Because we worked up to 20 hours a day and so there's not a lot of sleep happening, and she was in almost every scene.

"I was in about a quarter of the scenes and it turned me to ash," he confessed. "I can't imagine what would have happened to my psyche if I had her workload. I think I might just have had a breakdown around season 5. I mean, anyone really would.

"TV shows normally film for around 12 hours a day and that's long enough, frankly. But Sarah was always there and she never flagged, she was never late, she always had a good attitude, she knew her lines, she was a monster.

"And consequentially, no one else could relax because she was always just so on point. She was amazing," he reiterated.

Giving a sweet insight into their friendship now, he revealed that they would often share updates with each other about their families, reports .

He said: "Sometimes we email each other about our kids and we'll be like, 'Oh they're doing this, they're doing that.'

"My kids are older than hers so I always beat her," Marsters quipped. "She'll say, 'My kids just learned to make brownies, yay!' And I'll say, 'Well my son just got back from China,'" he added with a laugh.

Speaking about the reboot, he said: "It's good because I think the world needs Buffy Summers. The world needs that message maybe more than ever."

Unwilling to give too much away about the reboot, he insisted: "I'm not allowed to talk about any of it!

"I'm trying to thread the needle here..." he added. "But what I will say is that at the beginning of every show we said, 'For every generation there's a new slayer.'

"And that was a promise that we never really made good on, and I think that it's high time someone did."

All seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer are available to stream now on ITVX.