How Comedy Dave felt 'utterly betrayed' when Chris Moyles was snapped on a family holiday to Cyprus with his estranged wife - as insiders tell DOLLY BUSBY it 'permanently ended' their friendship

Beaming at the camera, their skin pink and clammy from the muggy Cypriot weather and a long evening drinking red wine, they appeared like any group of relaxed holidaymakers.

But the picture, taken in August 2011 outside the Coral Bay bar in Paphos, became a decade-long headache as it brought a ‘betrayal’ to light.

Among the revellers caught in the blurry snap were the host, , and his Radio 1 sidekick’s wife, Jayne Sharp – who was without her husband, Dave Vitty, better known as Comedy Dave.

Five months earlier, Vitty had announced he was divorcing Jayne, his wife of three years, with whom he shares a daughter, Nicole, now 19. So it might have seemed strange that she was now popping up on a family holiday with Moyles.

Also on the booze-fuelled trip were Moyles’s brother, Kieron, and his sister-in-law, Kerry.

While there was no suggestion that anything romantic had taken place between the pair, it was still enough to ‘permanently end’ Vitty’s relationship with both parties.

For more than a decade, little has been known about exactly why Vitty and Moyles – radio’s once-beloved double act – fell out so spectacularly after 15 years of friendship, and what role this now infamous holiday snap played.

But I can now confirm it was this picture that ‘permanently ended’ the relationship and, during their final months together after the photograph emerged, the on-air partners sat in silence every morning in the studio while the 2012 hits blared from the speakers.

Sources close to the station tell me: ‘Dave felt utterly betrayed. He couldn’t even look at Chris. Towards the end, they would sit in total silence, furiously ignoring each other while music was playing.’

Insiders at the BBC have revealed the situation became ‘impossible’ for all involved - Moyles was expecting to be ‘backed fully’ by the BBC chiefs due to his status as the self-proclaimed ‘Saviour of Radio 1’ and the station’s biggest star at the time.

In fact, sources have explained, so alarmed were bosses by the increasingly ‘fiery and toxic’ relationship between the former best friends that Radio 1 bosses hurried Nick Grimshaw, then 27, to replace Moyles a year before planned.

When it was announced he would be leaving the show, Moyles chose to focus on the narrative he had been fired because he was ‘too old’ and replaced by a presenter 11 years his junior.

‘I was a bit miffed that the story that went out was that I was too old and I had got fired,’ reflected Moyles on Ross Kemp’s podcast in 2020.

‘I thought they handled it really badly. Then when [Grimshaw’s] show failed and the listening figures fell, I was like, “Not that f***ing easy, is it boys?”’

There was no mention of the disruption caused by his behind-the-scenes rift with Vitty.

The pair met in 1997 while Moyles was hosting the overnight show on Radio 1 and Vitty was employed as a technical operative, or button pusher, on the Mark and Lard Breakfast Show.

It was a friendship forged by aligning shift patterns, often followed by long days drinking in the pub. Vitty was soon invited by his new friend to join the Chris Moyles Show, and their on-air chemistry led them to becoming one of radio’s longest-running duos.

The nickname Comedy Dave was sarcastically given to the new presenter by comedian Lee Hurst after Vitty introduced himself as ‘Super Dave’ on air.

Known for their pub jokes and stunts, including a world record-breaking 52 hours on air that they set together in 2011, the pair were beloved by the 7.9 million weekly listeners.

But, 14 years after meeting, the pair had separate leaving dos, with members of their teams joining Vitty at a London pub before moving on to meet Moyles in another one later in the night.

But in a third pub, outside London, rumours were swirling about what had really happened between the media stars.

Staff under the wooden beams of Merlin’s Cave in the sleepy village of Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire, began to talk. The modest establishment was just minutes from the home Vitty once shared with his former ITV presenter ex-wife, Jayne and daughter Nicole.

As one barman put it at the time: ‘Everyone has been talking about it. I think they’ve split up over Chris Moyles – it sounds like his mate has run off with his Mrs from what everyone’s saying. They live nearby; I’ve seen them loads of times, and obviously I know who he is from Radio 1 and stuff. It’s quite the local scandal.’

By this time, the couple were no longer living together but both were quick to shut down queries when approached by reporters for comment.

Vitty, who at the time appeared to be living away from the family home, has never commented and retained a dignified silence.

Jayne, who had appeared on late night TV shows hosting Bingo and call-in competitions and also previously dated and lived with the once-wild broadcaster Chris Evans while working as a runner at the BBC, also refused to comment.

As one media source recalls: ‘She was livid that it had started to leak out – but it was inevitable, especially once the holiday pictures came out.

‘She has a daughter with Dave, so you can perhaps understand why they’ve both kept quiet, but it felt like she had been caught off guard and embarrassed by it all.