Who is the new Late Late Show host Patrick Kielty? Here’s everything we know
Patrick Kielty and Cat Deeley at the Ifta red carpet earlier this month.Kielty has been confirmed as thee next host of the Late Late Show. Picture: Damien Eagers/PA Wire
After much speculation and anticipation, Patrick Kielty has officially been named as the next host of RTÉ’s .
The stand-up comedian and TV personality from Dundrum, Co Down, will take over from Ryan Tubridy who has been at the helm of the chat show for 14 years.
Kielty had been highly tipped as Tubridy's replacement.
In a recent interview, his wife Cat Deeley said she thought her husband would do a “phenomenal” job as host of the late-night chat show. She said she believes he has the right balance of entertainment and politics, “and he’s got skin in the game”.
With Tubridy set to host his final episode on May 26, here’s everything we know about his replacement.
Kielty grew up in Down during the Troubles. His father, Jack Kielty, who was a building contractor, was shot dead by a loyalist parliamentary group in 1988 when he was 44 and Kielty was just 16.
During an interview on the last year, Kielty opened up about his father’s murder, which happened on his brother’s 18th birthday. According to Kielty, his father was a chairman of the local Gaelic club and a “prominent Catholic in the area”.
“Everybody said they were sorry, everybody hugged us but nobody said they couldn't believe it,” he said. “That is how things were up there, that was the normality of it.”
In 2002, Kielty met his future wife, Cat Deeley while the pair were working on the TV Show, . While they both had partners at the time, they became friends and kept in touch until one big romantic gesture changed everything.
While Deeley was in the States and he was having a couple of pints in his local, Kielty texted her a happy birthday message. When she replied, he called her.
“I call her and ask her what she’s doing for the birthday,” he told the Tommy Tiernan Show earlier this year. “She says, ‘I’m am having a lunch tomorrow in the Beverly Hills Hotel and it’s a shame you’re not around.’ So I said, ‘I’ll be there, so’. But she said, ‘Good night, you’re p*ssed’.”
But he stuck to his promise and headed to the airport. “I walked in [to the hotel] and she fell off the chair and we’ve been together ever since,” he said.
The pair got married in Rome in 2012 and went on to have two sons together — Milo who is seven and James who is five.
Kielty is an award-winning stand-up comedian and has plenty of presenting gigs under his belt too.
The 52-year-old has hosted for Channel 4 as well as his own BBC chat show, . The father of two also has a radio talk show on BBC 5Live.
Kielty started his stand-up career as host of comedy club The Empire Laughs Back in Belfast which was established in 1992. His professional career began the year prior after vising Dublin stand-up club, the Gasworks while he was studying psychology at Queen’s University Belfast. Since then he has presented a number of shows, including the original .
Kielty has also worked on documentaries and films. Released in 2018, his Bafta-nominated documentary also saw the Kielty named UK documentary host of the year at the 2018 Grierson Awards. In 2021, he released which won an RTS award for best presenter.
Last year his first feature film, , which was shot at the Ards Peninsula and Belfast, was released. It marked his screen acting debut. In the film, the comedian played the role of Shane alongside Ifta-nominated Seána Kerslake.
