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Pat Kenny presented The Late Late Show, the longest-running chat show in the world, for ten years from 1999–2009. His time as presenter has been remembered for several interviews and incidents involving phone-in competitions and unexpected interruptions. In 2006, Kenny interviewed Joe O'Reilly following the murder of his wife Rachel; O'Reilly was later convicted of the crime. Also that year, Kenny was subjected to an unscheduled verbal attack by an intruder live on air; the man later targeted Kenny's house and RTÉ's television studios with threatening posters and his car.

Kenny has even been subjected to criticism during interviews by his own guests, particularly musicians such as Enrique Iglesias and Pete Doherty. Whilst attempting to give away a prize of two tickets to his last ever edition of The Late Late Toy Show in November 2008, he expressed his frustration with the winning caller by tearing up the tickets live on air.

Throughout his time presenting the show, audiences remained high as ever, with Kenny saying he had "[kept] the brand alive". He appeared across various media to promote and discuss the show, including The Cafe on RTÉ Two and The Will Leahy Show on RTÉ 2fm. He resigned live on air on 27 March 2009 and hosted his final show two months later on 29 May 2009.

Personal highlights
Kenny described his highlight of his decade with The Late Late Show as riding into the studio on the back of an elephant, as his father had done in his time as a zookeeper. Kenny described it as his "wow moment". As a child, he rode on the back of an elephant, knew an elephant's smell and strength and felt the wiry elephant hair. Amongst his favourite guests were singers Rod Stewart and Michael Bublé, actor Michael Caine and comedian Joan Collins. Other stand-out moments for him were interviewing Ian Paisley and his wife, meeting Paul Newman and Jack Nicklaus and he recalled the occasion in 2008 when he tore up a pair of tickets for the Toy Show, and "it turns out to be one of the most memorable moments of the year".

Kenny has said that the one guest he would have liked to have interviewed during his tenure as host of The Late Late Show would have been Diana, Princess of Wales, whilst a couple he would have liked to have interviewed had he continued in his capacity as presenter would have been US President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. One guest whose opinion of he changed after he interviewed her was the British reality television star Jade Goody.

Crew
Kenny has spoken of the closeness he felt between himself and his team on The Late Late Show. When the guests and audience left after each show, they would meet to discuss and drink together. They were familiar with each other's personal lives and knew each other's families. Having experienced a loss of this bond with those he had worked with before The Late Late Show, Kenny said he would be saddened to leave them but also wished them all well, describing them as a "winning team".

Media coverage
Kenny and the Irish media have had a difficult relationship since he took on the role as host of The Late Late Show, with comparisons being made between the different styles of himself and his predecessor, Gay Byrne. He has said he did not read any criticism of his style in the newspapers as he trusted the ratings reflected his ability to do his job. Kenny said journalists were paid to say "nasty things" about him and that his wife knew she would never read an article on the positive side of his career. This negative and inaccurate media coverage peaked in 2008 during his annus horribilis, when Kenny endured a legal battle with a neighbour over land followed by the death of his mother.

Toy Shows
Pat Kenny presented ten editions of The Late Late Toy Show, including his last one on 28 November 2008. They are remembered for several incidents, including Kenny's tearing of a pair of tickets at the end of the episode preceding his last Toy Show after the presenter became frustrated by a caller. This occurred when prize-winner Barbara Heavey from Cork decided live on air that she was “not particularly interested” in attending the Toy Show, with Kenny whisking the tickets from his pocket, tearing them to shreds and ominously uttering, “I think I’ll give up this job”. Heavey later suggested Kenny was ungracious and reiterated her lack of interest in watching children "play with toys for two hours", adding that she has no children of her own. Despite numerous attempts by RTÉ to have her attend the Toy Show, she said she would be "bored stiff", wasn't interested in toys and, if she had to attend the show, would probably "set off the smoke alarms by chain-smoking in the toilets". When Jerry Seinfeld appeared on one edition of the Toy Show to promote Bee Movie, Kenny began the interview with the line: “Will you welcome Jerry Seinfield”, before going on to display a lack of knowledge about Seinfeld's background but plenty about his latest film.

Notable events
Kenny was preceded as presenter by the show's original host, Gay Byrne, who performed the role for 37 years before retiring. Prior to taking over from Byrne, Kenny had hoped to move his original Saturday night show, Kenny Live, into the Friday night slot occupied by The Late Late Show. Kenny was announced as Byrne's successor by Joe Mulholland, who was RTÉ's managing director of broadcasting at the time. Mulholland described Kenny as "a very accomplished broadcaster" and "the right man for the job". Patrick Kielty was the other main contender but declined as he had commitments in the neighbouring United Kingdom. Kenny began presenting the 38th season of the show in September 1999 at the age of 51.

Brendan Gleeson interview
Whilst appearing on The Late Late Show in March 2006, Brendan Gleeson described Irish hospital facilities as “akin to war crime”. Gleeson went on to describe his own experiences, particularly those of his father, as the audience applauded. He also questioned why anyone would want to elect the same government again.

Joe O'Reilly interview
Kenny has described his 2006 interview with Joe O'Reilly, the husband of murdered Rachel O'Reilly, as the most memorable moment of his time on The Late Late Show. O'Reilly appeared on the show alongside his wife's mother, Rose Callaly, to plead for his wife's killer to come forward. Kenny recalled "thinking the whole thing was odd" and that "the body language between Rachel's parents and Joe was cold". He also found O'Reilly's lack of emotion strange, especially since his wife had died not long before. Callaly looked on astounded as O'Reilly described details of her daughter's body, interjecting with: “Pat, she had a horrific death”. Joe O'Reilly was convicted of the murder of Rachel O'Reilly in July 2007.

"Rude interruption"
On the 24 November 2006 edition of the show, whilst Kenny was introducing the unsuspecting You're a Star judges Linda Martin, Brendan O'Connor and Thomas Black as guests, Paul Stokes approached him and spoke several uncensored expletives live on air. Stokes described Kenny and Gay Byrne as "insufferable arseholes". An emergency commercial break was ushered in whilst Stokes was removed from the set as Kenny uttered "thank you very much" to the intruder. Kenny returned by apologising to his viewers: "Sorry for that rude interruption". The Today FM presenter Jenny Kelly famously went into labour whilst laughing at the incident on her television screen, her initial intention having been to "bore the baby into arriving".

Eight days after this incident, Stokes drove his car into the revolving doors of the main RTÉ television building in Montrose and also daubed walls near Kenny's home with posters preaching the slogan: "Paul Stokes is still here, but Pat Kenny won't be soon". He was said to have been incensed by an article published in the Sunday Independent describing his interruption of The Late Late Show and his relationship with his daughter.

Stokes claimed he had been in contact with RTÉ over several weeks and months to talk about his invention designed to prevent any road traffic accident but that they were "failing their duty" by not giving him more time on air.

Enrique Iglesias interview
Singer Enrique Iglesias appeared on The Late Late Show in 2007, informing his host of his thoughts: “You seem like a serious man. You’re like the Irish Larry King – and even better-looking, obviously”. Kenny then attempted to discuss Iglesias's personal relationship with tennis player Anna Kournikova but the singer stopped midway through the interview to comment: “You’re embarrassing me. You ask the questions so dry and so seriously that it kind of scares me”.

The Three Wise Men
The "three wise men" of Eamon Dunphy, Eoghan Harris and John Waters are notable for two appearances on The Late Late Show, the first in May 2007 to talk about that year's Irish general election, the second in March of the following year. The first appearance saw Harris defending Bertie Ahern (then Taoiseach) against Dunphy's criticisms. The second appearance led to tears from Dunphy and applause from the audience. Dunphy commented later: “If you get applause on The Late Late, you are usually doing something wrong”.

Austria family holiday incident
With Jimmy Carr, Michael Colgan and Michael Gambon having just been interviewed, Kenny called a mystery phone number to give away a prize of a family holiday in Austria. Carr, upon realising the location and type of holiday on offer, made several jokes referencing the recent Fritzl case, such as “It’s in a basement! You’re going to love it!” as Kenny countered with “This is a most desirable prize”. The presenter asked the winner “How many in the family?” only to receive the reply “Just meself”. Kenny then fell off his chair with laughter and suggested he would send the three studio guests with the winner if he was "stuck", only for him to respond “I’m not stuck at all!” as the credits rolled.

Pete Doherty interview
In the opening segment of the 6 February 2009 show, Pat Kenny tried to interview the English musician Pete Doherty. When a young female audience member loudly professed her love for Doherty and shouted how she had waited outside Trinity for four hours to catch a glimpse of him, Kenny responded by saying: "You have at least one fan in the audience". The Babyshambles singer was dissatisfied with Kenny's repeated questioning of his drug abuse and love life and became incensed with a difficult comparison between him and Shane MacGowan before asking the presenter: "I don't know if you could name a song that I've written?", only to receive the reply: "No, possibly not." Doherty went on to ask why "this [the drugs issue] has to be the be all and end all of how you look at someone and judge someone", and having counted Kenny's questions informed him that "the last 12 questions you've asked me have been about drugs". In protest at Kenny's apparent lack of knowledge on his subject matter, Doherty pulled his hat over his eyes and refused to engage any further in the conversation. Kenny attempted to resolve the situation by inviting the Doherty to play a song for the audience (an acoustic cover of a song from his upcoming solo album) at which point the singer left his seat and walked off the set. Doherty had been in Ireland to attend Trinity College, Dublin where he was made an Honorary Patron of the student Philosophical Society at the university earlier that day. There were even suggestions that Doherty had been called by the show to fill a gapleft by the absence of controversial poet Cathal O'Searcaigh. The Irish Independent referred to the interview as "TV gold" but The Irish Times dubbed it "car-crash television".

Resignation
Kenny announced his resignation live on air on 27 March 2009. Throughout the show, he referred to the "bit of news" he had to share. He informed his crew of his decision around 45 minutes before the show went on air, provoking tears from his research and production teams.

Kenny's decision to resign was influenced by his wife, Kathy, who suggested that were he to continue as presenter for another five years, she would leave him. Kenny had wanted to present the show for one more year. He instead moved to the Monday night slot on the same channel to present a political debate show which replaced the long-running Questions and Answers.

Final episode
Kenny's final episode as host was aired on 29 May 2009. It was self-described by the host as "one of our most unusual Late Late shows". Prior to the final episode, the presenter described himself as "looking forward" to it, saying he would be "getting a huge buzz for the show... I'm not even thinking of the last Late Late Show. This is another show that has to be done. The scripts have got to be written, rehearsals have got to be done so you think of it absolutely professionally." Appearing on The Will Leahy Show on RTÉ 2fm two days before his last show, Kenny said: "I feel great. I made this decision a long time back but still you end up with eight or nine shows to do but... the end is nigh".

For the final episode, filming was taken outside the normal studio setting to an area with a "garden party" theme. A farmers' market featured on the show with several Irish suppliers providing food. The identities of the guests were kept a secret as the night approached, although The Irish Times correctly reported that U2 would feature. The episode was two hours long and also featured comedian Pat Shortt, actor Gabriel Byrne and singer Imelda May as guests.

Gabriel Byrne spoke of his past as a victim of physical and sexual child abuse and his horror at that week's revelations of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, saying: “The reality is that young boys and young girls who didn’t know any better were physically penetrated with spittle and Vaseline by grown men and women”. U2 performed "Magnificent" before gifting Kenny a rare Gibson guitar and a pair of the “Pope's shades”. During their interview, Bono spoke of getting lost in 10 Downing Street during Tony Blair's time as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and the difficulties their manager, Paul McGuinness, had when finding a tour van for them in their early career. Following this, the show went outdoors, where the audience were treated to a barbecue and Kenny's wife and daughters joined him as the credits rolled.

RTÉ later reported viewing figures of 996,000 for Kenny's final episode. A total of 1,383,000 watched the episode. This represented a 55% audience share. Kenny was criticised for allowing Gabriel Byrne to endorse an election candidate, the actor and friend of Byrne, Mannix Flynn, on his final show, with a complaint later being upheld and forcing RTÉ to issue an apology.