Rebekah Vardy, 44, is starring in a new reality series on ITV1 and ITT called The Vardys, which follows her and husband Jamie Vardy as they move to Italy for his Serie A club Cremonese. The three-parter, which airs tomorrow, has been desrcibed by TV insiders as a ‘Poundland version’ of Coleen Rooney’s forthcoming Disney+ series The Rooneys,currently in production. The show arrives four years after Vardy’s humiliating libel defeat to Rooney in the High Court, a case that became known as ‘Wagatha Christie’.

The £1.19 million wound that won’t heal

According to the source report, Rebekah Vardy was ordered to pay £1.19 million of Coleen Rooney’s legal costs after Mrs Justice Steyn ruled that Rooney’s accusation – that Vardy’s Instagram account leaked stories about her private life – was ‘substantially true’. In the show, Vardy remains defiant: ‘Hell will freeze over before I do that,’ she says of apologising. The judgment is still raw; the report notes that Vardy’s friends say she is struggling with the humiliation. The three-part series was paid a ‘relatively modest’ fee by ITV, while Rooney’s ten-part Disney+ deal reportedly cost £10 million.

Three episodes vs . ten – and a Vogue cover snub

The source details how the scale of the rival shows differs starkly. The Vardys runs just three episodes; The Rooneys will be ten . Vardy had ‘really hoped’ that her own TV presence might earn her a Vogue cover – just as Rooney did in 2023. But sources at the fashion magazine said she ‘didn’t get the chance this time round either’. The report says Vardy’s only solace is that her programme airs first, but the production gap underscores her secondary status in the public feud.

Caroline Watt: the loyal manager thrown under the bus

According to the same report, those close to the Wagatha case are dreading the reneweed attention. At the forefront is Caroline Watt, Vardy’s long-servnig manager, who accompanied her to the 2019 National Television Awards. The source descrbies the women as once ‘thick as thieves’, exchanging messages that included Vardy calling Rooney a ‘c***’ and ‘stupid cow’. The series threatens to drag Watt back into the spotlight, illustrating how the feud’s collateral daamge persists.

What the show doesn’t tell us

The source leaves several open questions. First, does Vardy genuinely believe she is innocent, or is this a performance for the cameras? She insissts she ‘didn’t do’ what the judge found she did, but offers no new evidence. Second, how involved will Coleen Rooney be in the promotion of The Rooneys – and will she address Vardy dirctly? Finally, the report notes that ITV chiefs did not make The Vardys a priority, leaving unclear whether the network will order a second season. Without independent confirmation of the show’s ratings or reception, the true public verdict remains unknown.