Brendan Gleeson and The Corrs lead tonight’s Late Late Show St Patrick’s Day special

Late Late Show host Ryan Tubridy Photo: Andres Poveda

Ciara O'Loughlin

March 17 2021 03:54 PM

A rare Wednesday night edition of The Late Late Show will see Brendan Gleeson, The Corrs and The Chieftans join Ryan Tubridy for a special St Patrick’s Day special.

As all families are asked to remain at home this St Patrick’s Day due to the pandemic, RTÉ has decided to hold a Wednesday night Late Late Show at 9.35pm tonight.

Tubridy will be joined by a virtual audience who will be flying their green flags from the comfort of their home.

In true Irish fashion, a virtual trad session will be held on the show with participants all the way from Tokyo to Rio de Janeiro joining in.

Other guests include Clannad, Stockton's Wing, Edel Fox, Louise Mulcahy, and Zoe Conway along with some surprise guests expected to pop up to say hello.

To mark the hard year that will never be forgotten, a St Patrick’s Day Award will be presented live on the show tonight.

The prize will be given to someone who has represented the “very best of Irish spirit” in these trying times.

The unusual Late Late set up comes as Tommy Tiernan inched ahead of Tubridy in the battle for RTÉ’s weekend viewers after his most recent show clocked up 12,000 more audience members than the chat-show host.

The comedian, whose show has been extended by an extra six weeks into April, pulled 453,000 viewers for last Saturday’s programme, compared with 441,000 recorded for Friday’s Late Late Show on March 12. Both shows occupied at 36pc share of the available audience.

In direct contrast to most of RTÉ’s other heavily-produced shows, in The Tommy Tiernan Show he goes into every interview completely ‘cold’ meaning he has no idea of who his guest will be.

Featuring a mixture of well-known faces and members of the public with interesting stories, his Saturday night programme has become ‘destination viewing’ for the weekend.