Three Late Late Show talking points, including how a Cork headmistress inspired Fiona Shaw
Fiona Shaw on the Late Late Show
Cork actor Fiona Shaw was among the guests on Friday night’s Late Late Show and she spoke to Patrick Kielty about rediscovering her home county in recent years.
"I'm there a lot because my mother is very old now. She's 99 next month,” Shaw, who is from Cobh, explained, adding she was away for work often so she feels “like a tourist” when she is home.
"I was away. I was often in the theatre and therefore away or on tour so often. I was always back for Christmas but I'm getting to know Cork and West Cork, if ever I can escape up west. I'm kind of discovering the country like a tourist and like a Yank going around the country.”
Shaw also revealed she based her performance in Three Men and a Baby on her headmistress in Cork who was “always rummaging down her chest”.
“Generations of schoolchildren at Scoil Mhuire knew I had based it on that particular woman,” she said. “In a way it was quite a local performance — don’t sweat the big stuff, just do what you know.”
She also spoke about her recent work, including Hot Milk, Park Avenue, Bad Sisters, Killing Eve and Fleabag.
TV presenter Kathryn Thomas opened up about the “shame” and “stigma” she felt about her own weight while growing up.
Thomas’s new documentary The Skinny Jab Revolution explores the root cause of obesity and the rise of weight loss drugs and she told the Late Late she was bullied as a child because of her weight.
“I was quite overweight as a kid. I remember the name-calling, the stigma, the shame,” she said, recalling one memory of a teacher calling her “an cailín is ramhar sa sheomra” — the biggest girl in the room.
"I was lucky that I found sport and in my teenage years I lost weight but I know other children who were in that classroom and had that teacher and that had a life-long impact on them."
Thomas, who was the host of Operation Transformation, also criticised “the lack of regulation and understanding” of weight-loss drugs, claiming it was easy for her to access the medication in Ireland by providing false information through an online service.
Returning RTÉ 2FM presenter Doireann Garrihy spoke about the abrupt departure of several radio hosts from the station last year, denying it was a planned exodus.
Garrihy, who returns to 2FM on Monday, left the station in May last year after five years, where she presented 2FM Breakfast with Doireann, Donncha and Carl. At the time she said she would be focusing on her podcast, travelling, and other “dream” projects. Among those projects was her recent wedding to Mark Mehigan.
She said her departure was not connected to the other presenters choosing to leave, including Donncha O'Callaghan, the 2 Johnnies and Jennifer Zamparelli.
"The timing was strange. I said I was leaving and then a number of different presenters left so it was a weird time,” she said.
“I wasn’t surprised by the amount of publicity around it. I hadn’t spoken to the others at all so I didn’t know they were going to go as well."
Garrihy also addressed the controversy around a paid social media post she published on her Instagram account while she was still working in RTÉ.
"That wasn’t a pleasant time. I made a mistake at the time. I have a responsibility working for the national broadcaster. I shouldn’t have done it. I was reprimanded at the time, I apologised. You live and learn."
