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RTÉ BROADCASTER MIRIAM O’Callaghan believes her name may have been in the mix when deciding who would present The Late Late Show – but it’s not something she has her eye on.
O’Callaghan currently presents Prime Time on RTÉ One, as well as Miriam Meets, a Sunday morning Radio 1 programme.
She’s also taking back the Saturday night TV slot with the eleventh series of her summer programme.
This is filling the gap between Brendan O’Connor’s departure, and ahead of Ray D’Arcy’s new show starting in autumn
But O’Callaghan doesn’t want to be the permanent face of this – or the flagship Friday night slot.
“I have no desire to present the Late Late,” she told The Anton Savage Show on Today FM.
“I love looking at it, and Ryan [Tubridy] is doing a great job. I think it will be going long after we’ve all gone to another world, but no, it’s not for me.”
I think in the past at the time when Ryan got it there had been a view I might have been a choice for it, but you move on in life.
The show was presented by Gay Byrne until 1999, followed by Pat Kenny until 2009 when Tubridy took the reins.
O’Callaghan describing planning life as a “pointless exercise”, noting that she trained as a solicitor before entering the world of broadcast journalism, which has now become ‘part of her DNA’.
O’Callaghan added that she considered cancelling her appearance on Today FM yesterday following the deaths of six Irish students in California.
“I just find that even coming along to talk happy-clappy about the chat show, it jars to be honest,” she said.
The broadcaster went on to lambaste the New York Times for their coverage of the tragedy:
That journalism was disgraceful, but why focus on that? For me, the focus is the incredible tragedy that has occurred, and how people are going to try to get their lives back together.
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Does it make a difference at the end of the day? It would still be the same tired format with the same tired guests like Louis Walsh and Twink every other week.
Yes it makes a difference. Tubridy stopped many people watching, including myself. Hence the lightweight calibre of guests. Hes a bumbling fool, he is patronising to women and he is unable to remain impartial during debates. But why on earth would RTE ask us licence fee payers what we think?
@ Linda, I couldn’t agree more – he’s dreadful. Bland, emaciated and completely superficial…I have no idea how he could be commanding a salary of half a million per annum. Says a lot about us really, and none of it good. Awful.
I think since Gaybo (love him or hate him) the LLS has struggled. IMO it’s gone beyond its “Best before date”.
I think the presenters since Gaybo have been trying to mimic him rather than trying something new. tubridy, for me, is awful. not genuine at all. a bit of a lightweight. no real substance. now whether he is all of those things or whether the format he’s pressed into elicits those things I am not sure…. and don’t really care. I think his toy shows have been good mind.
Dara O’Briain would be my choice, can do the funny lighthearted stuff and the serious stuff too.
Now that is a great idea!!! Much better than Tubs. He makes me cringe!!!
It’s struggled because RTE is the FF/FG of TV companies. It’s all about cronyism and jobs for the boyos
I hope your not saying that tubridy got the job because of his families’ *massive* links to fianna fail? if that’s the case, then this interview was prepping the next presenter of the show, also with family links to all political parties, RTE and the media at large (he’s the guy opposite Miriam)
Ryan Tubridy, to me, is the presenter that keeps failing upwards. The first Tv show he got was All Kinds of Everything, with Mario Rosenstock doing a ‘syncro vox’ thing with photos of folks like Gaybo and Colin Farrell. The show was so bad, they couldn’t get contestants for the next series…so they went for the ‘celebrity’ version…equally painful. Two series were enough-it got scapped, thank God.
So that should have been the end of things…and then he was given the Rose of Tralee. And he genuinely was horrible. The roses looked visibly uncomfortable. He even got admonished by one by one of them years later. She appeared on his show, after doing rather successfully on stage in theatre and musicals.( Cannot remember her name, but she starred in Chicago: The musical.) And she spoke about how he’d been rather unkind, and her family spoke to her after saying something like ‘what was he at talking to you like that’. Well, he was terrible at that, and the ratings went down rather quickly too. Well, then he gets his own show, Tubridy Tonight…and it was RTE interviewing RTE, while imitating Letterman. Again, terrible.
And then he gets the Late Late show…and now we’re here. The strange, irritating thing about him is his interview style/ presenting style never changed. There is a clip of him on Scratch Saturday, all the way from 1989, when he was 16. He’s the same bland person then as he is now. No charisma, none. Seriously, you can google it and find it on RTE’s archives. Judge for yourself.
Why do RTE always look in house for presenters is it to justify their massive salary?
Just can’t watch late late anymore, way too smug & boring.
Seems every time I switch over to RTE One Miriam is on the dam thing. Now shes attacking the radio at the weekend also.
Way too much Miriam as it is.. They seem to flog us to death with the same characters week in week out. TV 3 are the very same.
I could’nt agree with you more Paul.There is hardly a week goes by that Miriam does’nt appear in some publication or other.Media junkie and Drama queen.Give the young talent a chance from whatever recourse.
Weak, stale, dated, boring. The Limp Lame Show might be a more apt title.
The guests on the Late Late Show, leave a lot to be desired, I used to watch it on RTE Player, depending on who was on it, but haven’t bothered in ages. Graham Norton on a friday night is much better IMHO.
Cancel it, or rename it ” Night of The Living Dead”
Tubs doing a great job!! Hahaha that’s the quote of the week!
Son interviewing mother ??
Would have been the better choice
Jesus that one is all over the place,is there anyone in RTE, the same faces on every show TV and radio
The box sets come handy when these abysmal chat show are on.
Which of the TOWIE cast will they interview this week…………..what’s on Netflix?
I’m sorry but Saturday Night with Miriam is awful. I love Miriam O’Callaghan on Prime Time and she’s great on the radio, but lighthearted entertainment is not her strong point. She looks so uncomfortable on Saturday Night – always on the edge of her seat, conversation is robotic and the guests, don’t get me started on the guests! Awful stuff.
always looks like she has trapped wind
boring monotone rugby player banging on about the grand slam (again) – selling a book/shoes/bogroll /wife/girlfriend/presenter of another rte show….
”top” model/blogger/”fashionexpert”
zzzz
her voice grates me..
Most chatshows now are just people selling some movie/record/tv show etc.
Even G Norton has ended up like this… esp. when they have a couple of people from the same new movie on it talking about how great it was to work together…the script drew them in…..etc….And Graham thinks it is FANTASTIC and a MUST SEE
zzzzzzzzzzz
Would love a chatshow with Daniel and his missus….they could be the new Richard & Judy
losing B.O’Connor to D’Arcy is a disaster
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