Miriam: I can’t match Graham for A-list celeb guests

RTÉ star Miriam O’Callaghan admits she will never have an A-list line-up on her talk show like Graham Norton.

Saturday Night With Miriam has just started its summer run on RTÉ, but she said yesterday on The Ray D’Arcy Show that big name guests tend to be reluctant to travel as far as Ireland.

She said she was pleasantly surprised at how nice the BBC star was when she recently interviewed him over the airwaves, but joked that she envies his superstar couch every week.

“I think it’s difficult to get guests anytime in Ireland. I had the joy recently of interviewing Graham Norton. He was really nice. You know the way you meet people who you’ve known before from the telly and you think they will be a pain, he is nicer than you think he is.

“But we were saying we all can’t stand him because he gets Will Smith and Tom Cruise and Jennifer Lopez and I just don’t think they come across to Ireland that much.”

But she said she thinks the Irish audience is quite happy to watch their native stars on a Saturday night.

“I think if you give people Irish people who are interesting and who have stories to tell, then that’s good.”

The mother-of-eight famously juggles her large brood with fronting shows on the radio and TV along with being the patron of a string of charities. But she insisted yesterday that she gets plenty of help from her childminder, Lorraine.

“They’re all at home except for the eldest girl. The youngest is seven. I used to have another woman called Bridget and now I just have Lorraine. They were both brilliant and I couldn’t do what I do without Lorraine.”

But she also said her husband, Steve Carson, director of RTÉ Television, does his fair share.

“My husband says it’s very funny that every time I do an interview I sound like I come home from Prime Time, empty the dishwasher, tidy up, and everyone must be saying ‘Jesus your husband is a right old lazy sod’, but he does loads as well to be honest and he does the bins.”

She also tried to press Today FM host D’Arcy into accepting an invitation to come on her TV show.

“Will you come on my chat show since I came on your radio show? My mother said she’d love to see you on the chat show. It is good manners.”

But D’Arcy joked: “It doesn’t work like that. Thanks for the invitation. I’m just really bad. I say some really stupid things.”