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30th October 2025
03:07pm GMT
The Inbetweeners star Joe Thomas has been talking about his latest project, working on a short comedy film exploring the Northern Lights as well as the stunning natural beauty of Iceland.
Joe Thomas, known to the British collective conscious as 'Simon from the Inbetweeners' has been embarking on his latest project in collaboration with Visit Iceland.
The actor and comedian plays the role of Nigel, described as the endearing and geeky leader of a group known as the A.U.R.O.R.A.S short for the catchy 'Alliance of Ultra Reliable Observers Ready for Aurora Spotting'.
Nigel spends his time with no-nonsense co-founder Helga and tag-along American Doug who form an intrepid trio looking for anyone to join their small fan group of aurora enthusiasts.
You can watch the film below:
Thomas spoke about how he drew on previous characters to portray Nigel with the face of Simon Cooper, the nerdiness of Will McKenzie and the personality of Kingsley Owen from his other popular show Fresh Meat.
Speaking exclusively to JOE, the actor joked "I actually think it's most like a character I played in a show that I wrote called Chickens that no one watched, but he was a very enthusiastic maths teacher".
He added: "I think he's kind of he's got a little bit of Simon's kind of boyish enthusiasm and some of Kingsley in Fresh Meat who is a geologist, of course, so you know he would he would really like Iceland."
The near-three minute film promotes the wonders of Iceland, its auroras, as well as its other unique activities such as whale watching and bathing in its thermal springs.
Thomas was clearly a fan of the country too, after spending time there for filming, as he reeled off fact after fact about the land of ice and fire.
He spoke of maybe even taking some of his hard-learned facts into his new podcast 'Joe and James Fact Up' with fellow Inbetweeners star and friend James Buckley (Jay Cartwright).
"I'm sure I will also talk about it on the pod because it was just a really cool experience," Thomas said.
"James will be annoyed because then he'll have to find a load of facts about like the Aurora.
"He likes doing facts about beer and stuff, but we can find, but we'll find a happy medium."
The Inbetweeners actor explained the enjoyment of playing Nigel in the short film as "really fun character to play."
He said: "I've been in quite a lot of things that are quite sort of cynical, I suppose.
"This was really nice to play a character who's just incredibly, wholeheartedly positive.
"It was just a pleasure to play that kind of character."
While filming the short AURORAS film, Thomas managed to catch the aurora in all its radiant beauty, explaining how it's often just a part of every day life in Iceland.
"We saw it while we were there you can see it just in like the middle of the street," he explained.
"You could be going to put your bins out or something and then there's just this amazing light show in the sky."
Delving further he spoke about how the Northern Lights "puts you in your place".
There's something particularly transcendent about this stuff that's caused by solar flares hitting stuff and then interacting with a magnetic field.
"That does put you in your place.
"And I think that puts things into perspective when you're overawed by something that's at that scale."
The Inbetweeners star was full of praise in general for the country talking about it's "all this mad stuff" that's there.
"Lava fields, waterfalls, and then at the same time nice cities and it's just kind of cosy and cool...it's very unique," he said.
"I really do want to visit again and take Hannah and take my daughter."
Everyone can join the A.U.R.O.R.A.S by visiting visiticeland.com/the-auroras, where you can do a quiz to get certified. And there’s even a chance to win a trip for two to Iceland this winter!
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