‘I don’t think I will do another 10-year run on the Late Late’
As presenter Ryan Tubridy looks forward to turning 50, he’s excited about the show but has no plans to beat Gay’s record run
PRESENTER Ryan Tubridy has revealed he has no intention of trying to emulate his hero and mentor Gay Byrne, as the longest-serving Late Late Show host.
Tubridy returns to our TV screens on Friday night, marking his 14th year at the helm of the iconic chat show.
But as he approaches his 50th birthday, Tubridy is determined to enjoy life as much as can and, although he loves his job, says he wants to pursue ‘other projects’ and spend as much time as he can with loved ones.
‘I am going to be 50 in May, which I know you find very hard to believe,’ the broadcaster laughs.
‘But for me, it is going to be that important. That is going to feature in my thought process.
‘Turning 50 is important. This, along with the pandemic, gave me pause for thought. I don’t want to be running on a treadmill as a much older person. I want to enjoy life as much as I do now.
‘When I finish on The Late Late Show I’m going to pursue other projects. I don’t know what they are yet. I play parlour game tricks on myself about what they might be. I am in dreamland.
‘But I don’t want to be older. I want to be older and excited still.’
While Tubridy says he has no intention of walking away from the world’s second longest chat show (after The Tonight Show in the US), he doesn’t think he will ‘see another decade’ presenting the programme.
‘This is my 14th year, and I did five years on Tubridy Tonight. So, I think I’ll be keeping an eye on everything in the next number of years. It won’t be today or tomorrow. But
I’m so happy, so I’m not going anywhere. I don’t think I will see another decade [on the Late Late].’
He insists that he is excited about the future and he hopes the best is still to come.
‘I still have some more in me,’ he told the Irish Mail on Sunday.
‘I have enough in me to make me still hungry. I think if the hunger stops then the game is over. I’m still ambitious. The show still matters very much to me. It’s under my skin. It’s in my soul. It means the world to the people, so I’m not going anywhere just yet.
‘I still have something slightly more to prove to myself as well. I think I can be a little bit better. I hope to do that,’ he added.
The passing of his great mentor Gay Byrne in 2019 and the tragic death of his friend Gerry Ryan in 2010 has given Tubridy a philosophical outlook as he approaches his milestone half century.
He saw how the role consumed Gay Byrne’s every waking minute and that he spoke before his death of his regret at devoting so much of his life to the Late Late and not thinking more of himself.
Tubridy told the MoS: ‘Gay gave some much of himself in a way that I have not done. I’ve got more to think about to work towards. I’m very excited about the future. So I want to enjoy my life.
‘In the past few years, I have lost a lot of colleagues. Especially my dear friend Gerry Ryan.
‘When I am away now with people, I find myself saying, “we’re here. This beer is delicious. Your company is delightful. Everything is wonderful”.
‘I am not talking about mindfulness; I am far too hyperactive a person for that.
‘But I find myself saying, “don’t walk by the sea and think about what you’re going to have for dinner”. Smell the sea breeze. Breathe in the fresh air. It’s just one of those things – a sort of realisation that it’s probably a little bit of growing up.’
The sentiments are typical of Turbidy’s openness and his willingness to share personal experiences and opinions – sometimes as the self-deprecating ‘old fogey’ – that appeals to so many viewers and listeners of all ages.
A lover of literature, a deep devotion to history, a critical thinker and
‘I want to be older and excited still’
a myriad of idioms and quirks could combine to afford Tubridy a lofty and rarefied reputation.
But his easy ability to be, at times, both sombre and jocular resonates strongly with his many guests and audiences, reflected in his enduring popularity and pre-eminence at headquarters in Montrose.
And he has always been very approachable, as the shoppers in his local SuperValu will no doubt testify.
Warmly welcoming the return of a full Late Late Show house after the era of Covid restrictions, he says: ‘With the pandemic over, there will be 200 people in the Late Late audience whose faces I will see every week. That’s going to be enormous. I mean, the audience is like the fifth Beatle for the Late Late Show and they were missing. They were missed,’ he said.
Tubridy says of his live audience: ‘There are all sorts… like a straw poll of Irishness on a given Friday. People still want tickets.
‘I mean, I could be in SuperValu on Saturday, and they will emerge from the fruit and veg aisle going, “any chance of tickets?”
‘They have this kind of currency. So that’s quite nice though, because it means that they want to come to the show.’
He admits the Covid years were, ‘very difficult. They were very heavy. They were exhausting. They were also strangely beautiful.
‘But I’m glad that’s over. But it was it was a tough time for everybody,’ he said.
This season will see Tubridy surpass Pat Kenny as the second longest-running host of the Late Late, but’s he’s still a long way off from Gaybo’s 34 years in the show’s hot seat.
Things, of course, have changed greatly since Byrne’s time. Today, a single seemingly innocuous question can put presenters in the eye of a ‘cancel’ storm, drowning in a sea of online condemnation.
But Tubridy insists he doesn’t let the fear of social media backlash inform either his thinking or his presenting style.
‘When you’re an interviewer, and if you can go to sleep safe in the knowledge that you asked every question that you asked in your day job, with good reason and no malice intended… you can sleep easy.’
But does he believe he now has to tread more carefully about the questions he asks?
‘Probably. I think now it’s a yeah. I think that’s the current climate we live in. How long does it last? It lasts as long as people get bored. It last as long as people feel that answers are becoming more sanitised. And people can’t be themselves as much as they used to be.
‘I don’t think, ultimately, the readers of your papers and magazines would want that.
‘But I’m told that the viewers and listeners and readers are safe enough. We actually want layered answers. We want people to be themselves. So please stop censoring and sanitising. So maybe that’s what’s going to happen.’
And as he has clearly embraced the non-censoring approach to interviews, I spot my chance to ask him about the current love of his life.
True to form, the filter reappears and with a good-natured laugh he replies without flinching: ‘Well now, I have to keep something back of myself.’
‘People can’t be themselves as much’