'There’s not too many polite Irish people in this': Kevin McGahern on The Traitors Ireland
Kevin McGahern hosts The Traitors Ireland: Uncloaked
10 minutes into my interview with Kevin McGahern, there’s a moment that leaves me a little… befuddled.
He’s riffing on how stand-up helps keep you sharp as an interviewer, and then it happens.
“A lot of interviewing is making guests feel uncomfortable. Sorry… making them feel comfortable.”
In the moment, we both laugh, but I can’t help wondering if his slip was of the Freudian variety.
While McGahern is happy to chat, I get the sense he would much rather be the interviewer than the interviewee.
He’s a hard one to read, and never really lets the wall down.
Perhaps that’s how the comedian-slash-actor-slash-writer-slash-podcaster-slash-presenter likes it or, in a world that wants to know what you’ve had for breakfast, maybe it’s a way of reserving the real Kevin McGahern for his nearest and dearest.
Regardless, his elusive vibe makes him the perfect fit for his latest gig as host of The Traitors Ireland Uncloaked, the companion show to the hotly anticipated Irish version of The Traitors, which starts on RTÉ One tomorrow.
He gets that Uncloaked’s deep dive into The Traitors’ suspenseful shenanigans is set to make it a compelling watch. The viewers will want more of the whos, whys, and wherefores, and McGahern is chomping at the bit to deliver just that.
While the 38-year-old from Gowna, Co Cavan freely admits he “wouldn’t be big into reality TV shows” and “stopped watching Love Island once Maura [Higgins] left”, he is a firm fan of the British version of TheTraitors and “inhaled” the first season in two days.
The British show has proven a monster hit, racking up huge viewership, but McGahern is confident the Irish version is going to knock it out of the park too — “I feel it will be the biggest show of the year” — not least because of its choice of host, “phenomenal” Derry Girls’ alumna Siobhán McSweeney.
“I don’t want to start a row, but I think she’s much better than Claudia [Winkleman], because she brings a sort of theatrical, arch, almost camp quality to it, she treats it like an acting role.”
With acting just one of the strings to his own multi-hyphenate bow, McGahern is well placed to assess McSweeney’s performance, although he’s keen to emphasise that, as yet, he’s only seen “little clips” of the show.
(He also shares that McSweeney’s wardrobe of mostly Irish designers is set to rival Winkleman’s clobber, which was so covetable it was reason enough to tune in.)
Over the years, he’s had an eclectic mix of roles — Video Nasty, Smother, The Dry — but the most fun, for him, is a comedy acting role, where he can improvise lines, try different ways of doing a scene, and like “boxers sparring” bounce off other “very funny people”.
He’s massively versatile, turning his hand as easily to hosting this year’s Iftas as to a stint on the 2023 season of Dancing With the Stars (he made it to the semi-final), or presenting Cheap European Homes.
It means he’s juggling a lot of balls sometimes, but the dad of two (daughter Wallis and son Jessie were born in 2020 and 2022 respectively) is keen to acknowledge the substantial role his wife, Siobhan Cassidy, plays in keeping it all going.
“Due to the nature of my work, no week is the same, which is a challenge” he says.
“Luckily, I have an amazing wife who does the majority of looking after the kids and the household and we make it work.”
Funny is his forte, with comedy the consistent throughline in an eclectic CV.
In 2009, having graduated from the University of Wolverhampton with a degree in animation, McGahern had already set his sights on a different path.
“In college, I started taking an interest in stand-up. What I liked about animation is you could make a funny little film, show your friends and make them laugh. With stand-up, it felt a lot more immediate.”
At 17, he was inspired by the “surreal and crazy” comedy of Steve Martin and Andy Kaufman, but a seminal influence came into his life at 14.
“Tommy Tiernan’s video came out and I’d never really seen an Irish comedian like that… he was making the type of comedy I’d never seen Irish people do.”
Tiernan’s debut video, Tommy Tiernan Live, “was passed around our secondary school”.
“I got my hands on it and it blew the back of my head open.”
After graduation, McGahern began contacting comedy clubs in Ireland but kept his new career direction to himself.
“I didn’t even tell my girlfriend at the time, just in case it went horribly wrong. I was sneaking out at night to perform these little clubs.”
At the beginning, he was playing to “rooms of 10 to 15 people for literally no money”, and recalls his “traumatically bad” debut at Kilkenny’s long-running Cat Laughs comedy festival, where he had to compete with a Chelsea versus Man United game for punters’ attention.
A year later, though, he was back in the Marble City, and he made time for this year’s outing too. What keeps him interested in doing gigs like that?
“I love Kilkenny. I love comedy festivals in general because we [comedians] don’t really get much of a chance to see each other. When you start off in comedy, you’re sharing a bill with maybe eight, 10 people.
“You’ve great chats. You’re sitting on the stairs in a grimy little pub. But the more successful you get, the more lonely it gets. Eventually, you’re just arriving in a town by yourself to do your hour. The good thing about festivals is we all get to hang out. It’s like summer camp.”
He’s doing it for the craic, then?
“No. I obviously enjoy performing [but comedy is] the one art form where you are completely in control of the end product.
“With television, even music, there are a lot of people telling you what you should be doing, or maybe you should do this. Comedy is the only art form where you’ve complete editorial control and, if it works, great. If it doesn’t, that’s all on you.”
McGahern didn’t tell his parents he was pursuing a career in stand-up —“I waited until they found out, which I preferred” — and he didn’t tell them he’d got the role of host on The Traitors Ireland: Uncloaked either.
“I didn’t tell my parents I was doing this job until it was announced on the news. I’m not sure why I do that.”
When it comes to divulging names of the celebrity guests Uncloaked will feature weekly, McGahern “can’t tell me too much” but namechecks broadcaster and comedian Oliver Callan, singer Lyra, “sexy Kerry farmer on TikTok” Séaghan O Súilleabháin, and his The Lovely Show podcast co-host, comedian Justine Stafford.
Will any celebrity superfans be making an appearance?
“Michael Fry got in touch with me when it was announced that I was doing it and was like, ‘please do everything you can to get me on this show’.” Funnyman Fry is now apparently “locked in” for an episode.
Two celebrity guests will join McGahern on Uncloaked to analyse the machinations of that evening’s episode of The Traitors — which was filmed in a spookied-up Slane Castle earlier this year — while the second half will see banished or murdered players join the chat to give their take on the show’s schemers and plotters.
McGahern intends to keep things relaxed, “more like a podcast feel” so that there’s lots of cross-chat, with everyone able to give their view.
McGahern calls The Traitors “highbrow reality TV” — an oxymoron, perhaps, but kind of bang-on too — and feels “people who might look down their noses at reality TV” will “allow themselves” to watch the show.
He admits, however, to having had some scepticism himself over whether Irish people were “too polite” to be on The Traitors, but the footage he has seen quickly disabused him of that notion.
“Very early on, the claws come out on this show. It is incredibly juicy.
“You’d be really surprised by some of the backstabbing that goes on in the episodes. I was kind of shocked.
“As I said, I’ve seen very little, but from the hints I’ve been given, there’s not too many polite Irish people in this show.”
- The Traitors Ireland starts Sunday, August 31 at 9.30pm on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player.
- Episodes will air weekly on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.
- The Traitors Ireland: Uncloaked will air directly after at 10.35pm and is also available wherever you get your podcasts
