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*WARNING: This article contains spoilers for last week’s episodes of The Traitors on RTÉ.*
SLANE CASTLE HAS always lent The Traitors Ireland a touch of theatre. But this week, with just a few episodes to go in the thrilling series, the show tipped into full-blown melodrama.
Pine coffins, wailing mourners, a fake funeral that was somehow both chilling and hilarious – and the quiet, inevitable fall of Paudie, the man who had survived arguably against the odds for nine tense episodes.
According to the man himself, Paudie was never supposed to last this long. Written off early and looked down on by his fellow traitors in the conclave, he was a suspect from the very start.
But at every roundtable, every vote, he found a way to wriggle free.
“Hand on my heart, I did not expect to get so far,” he said during an interview with journalists this week following his banishment.
“I really did expect that the rest of them would agree, ‘we’ll get rid of the old head and move on from there’. But it didn’t work that way. and I was just thrilled to keep going.”
That was Paudie all over: anxious, unpredictable, often hilarious without meaning to be. He swore he wasn’t a ‘f****** hugger’, cursed his way through tense moments, and became one of the most oddly endearing figures the show has produced.
The “people’s traitor,” some viewers called him.
Last week’s episodes left off on a cliffhanger, as Nick became the sole remaining traitor among just nine contestants following Paudie’s dramatic banishment.
Shortly before his banishment, faithful contestant Christine met her slow demise after receiving a piseóg, an ancient Irish curse, from Nick, in the form of a hug.
A funeral was held and no expenses were spared, even with RTÉ’s current budget woes – dozens of extras dressed in black, an open coffin (with Christine inside it), and even some tea and sandwiches.
Speaking to journalists after getting knocked out of the competition, Paudie and Christine opened up on their newfound fame, traitor tactics and their thoughts on who should win ahead of the final few episodes.
It will come as no surprise to viewers that Paudie has earned some fame from the show, being the natural star that he is.
Paudie, an ex-prison officer, is revelling in his newfound celebrity status since his banishment on Tuesday.
“I was in the Crescent Shopping Centre last week in Limerick, and was just trying to walk down the length of it, and it took me about 20 minutes!” he said.
“It’s brilliant to be honest, strangers walking past saying ‘hello Paudie’. It’s typically Irish.”
Paudie, or “the Paudfather” as Christine called him, became somewhat of an icon as he stumbled through the show and became everyone’s unofficial dad (official for Andrew, his son who also appeared on the show).
The Limerick man was surprised when the word icon was put to him by The Journal, however.
“Jesus, it’s tough to accept labels like that in relation to myself to be honest,” he laughed.
“I’m just happy that this has turned out so well for me,” he added.
Christine is also enjoying the newfound fame, despite being murdered.
“It’s great at my local coffee shop. The locals know me, but when a customer walks in they’re like, ‘oh my gosh, you’re from The Traitors’!”
She added that she does not feel any different after the show, however.
Christine, who spoke openly on the show about her experience with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), added that “many people” have reached out to her with heartfelt messages on social media about their experiences.
“There’s been quite a lot of people reaching out and sharing their personal stories of their own diagnosis, and we’ve agreed that more needs to be done with our health system,” she said.
“I quite openly shared that I had been dismissed a few times. It’s been really good because people feel a bit reassured, I’ve given people reassurance and hope.”
Whether you enjoyed his ‘tactics’ or not, Paudie survived as a Traitor through nine episodes of the show, which was by no means an easy feat.
Despite suspicions from the faithfuls since day one, he managed to scrape through with a mix of luck, rabid deflections of accusations and an occasional fellow traitor being thrown under the bus.
“It’s a game. We knew it was a game, and I was 100% behind being a Traitor,” Paudie said.
He added that he did feel a twang of guilt each morning at the breakfast table after the murders, however.
“It was hard to navigate at times, because you were killing somebody’s dream when you murdered them in the show, but it’s the game, and we had to do it,” he said.
“He struggled because he had such a big heart!” Christine added.
Tuesday’s faux funeral shenanigans were not without controversy – some were quick to criticise RTÉ over their apparent mocking of traditional Irish funerals.
Many also voiced concern as the coffin was closed over an innocent Christine. For many watching, it would take the current prize pot of €26,000 to put yourself through that.
Christine’s response? “It’s a game show.”
“We all grew up absolutely besotted with Father Ted here, so it’s part of our culture at this stage, that bitter humor.
“Of course, some people are going to have opinions and find it disrespectful in their own way, but again, it’s a game show, and there’s plenty of other soaps and dramas where they have funerals. They gave me a great send off”
During the funeral, host Siobhán McSweeney was, as always, dressed to the nines (in black of course, respectfully). Extras sobbed convincingly while the camera lingered on the coffins.
Faye, meanwhile, cried so hard she seemed to have forgotten it was a game. “She was s****ing it,” said Ben, not incorrectly.
Christine herself had joked only hours earlier: “Girls, I swear if one of you backstabs me I’ll come back and haunt you for the rest of my life.”
Instead, it was Nick who pulled the trigger.
Asked about her friendship in the castle with Faye and Amy by The Journal, Christine said that she was glad that the girls had not stabbed her in the back, and said she hopes the friendship between the two girls can last until the end of the show.
In recent episodes, the trio were seemingly inseparable, despite some traitor accusations being thrown around (sure what’s an unfounded traitor accusation between friends?).
“We’re all put into an environment where we have to quickly gel and bond without any phones, and no connections to the outside world, so you naturally build your relationships quite quickly,” Christine said.
“I feel as a whole group, we all got on quite well, and we all gelled in our own unique individual ways.
“I love all the girls, every single one of them, and I’ve a great love for each one of them individually. I do believe there will be really good friendships built amongst the group after this show,” she added.
She added that she hopes the remaining women can hold out until the end.
“Team girls all the way, come on girlies!” she said.
Paudie, for his part, did not speculate on the finale.
Will the faithful catch the one remaining traitor? Will Nick recruit again? Will Oyin correctly predict what’s going on for the 475th time?
The Traitors will be back on RTÉ tonight, tomorrow and Tuesday for the final three episodes.
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