British funnyman Ricky Gervais has opened up about his friendship with music icon David Bowie and revealed that after meeting him on 'Extras' he got to see what the 'Changes' star was like in person.

Speaking to GQ in the USA, Gervais explained that he asked the hitmaker to appear on an episode of his popular series, for which he had to record a song called 'Little Fat Man', and was overwhelmed when he was so open to the idea:

"Music and comedy...I think I might have said what a huge fan I was. And I think he liked my stuff...I got him to do a little thing in Extras. I remember we went round his flat, and it's exactly as you'd expect it to be – just beautiful and tasteful and modern, and there's this wonderful statue. And I went, 'Oh, that's amazing'."

When asked about being a fan of Bowie, 'The Office' star confessed that he considers him one of his ultimate musical heroes:

"He's been a musical hero of mine for 30 years. When I called him up and I'd written 'Little Fat Man', I said, "'Have you got the lyrics?' and he went, 'Yeah." I said, 'Can you do something quite retro, like ‘Life on Mars?'?' And he went [deadpan], 'Oh, of course, yeah, sure. I'll knock off a quick ‘Life On Mars?', shall I?'"