Late Late Show and Twitter

I know. ‘Twitter’ and ‘Late Late Show’ should not sit together in the same sentence. The former is a still-emerging micro-blogging technology that has captured the imagination of both IT types and the general population who want to join a wider ‘conversation’. The latter has been considered a great example of the deep malaise affecting more traditional media.

Ironically, on Friday night, Twitter helped play witness to a remarkable turnaround in the fortunes (albeit one swallow doesn’t make a summer) of the 47-year-old chat show dinosaur.

There was a considerable amount of tweeting all through Friday night but it still failed to officially ‘trend’. Most likely down to the fact that the tweets were spread across three hashtags (#latelate #latelateshow #lltub).

The perfect trend?

This was a fine example of where Twitter can really shine. The Late Late was a perfect Twitter trend as it had all of the following elements:

• A story that was developing ‘live’
• The entire Irish Twitter community had access to the event (assuming they wanted to participate, unlike say, a concert)
• It was highly topical anyway (new host)
• It was crying out for critical analysis
• It was - by Twitter standards - a local story
• A large segment of the Dublin Twitter community had been on the lash the night before at BTW in the Clarion Hotel and were therefore too tired to go out :)

So, what was the verdict from the Twitter community?

‘Dread’, ‘impending doom’, ‘weak guest line up’, ‘why Cowen?’ were the key themes in pre-show tweets. The new theme tune only added to that (but remember music is one of those rare things where ‘UNfamiliarity can breed contempt’, so maybe we need to hear it a few more times before deciding). However, after that, the messages were positive by a majority of probably of about 70 to 30 which is a stunning result really for RTE.

Guest by Guest Tweet Summaries

Brian Cowen

RT surprised everyone with the harsh line of questioning. Confident and maturely handled. Brian Cowen was rocked but then rallied well towards the end. His usual verbosity replaced with a much more direct speaking style that came across really well. The round of applause he got at the end was respectful (almost touching) and belied his 15% approval rating. Lots of positive tweets for both men, mixed with pops at the government, NAMA, etc.

Sharon Corr

There seemed a sense that people wanted her to do well but she didn’t. Pity. Pretty good song but weakish vocals and lacked a bit of presence. On the plus side she threw herself in at the deep end so maybe she’ll turn it around.

Brian McFadden

Some sympathy for Brian but overall view was that he should not be washing his dirty linen etc. New hairdo was also slated. Good questions by Ryan T.

Joan Collins

As always entertaining and as you’d expect lots of tweets re plastic surgery, putty and the like. The host handled it well again.

Cherie Blair

Opposite to Sharon in that people seemed to want to dislike her but they just can’t. Seems like a highly intelligent likeable lady. Mr T tried using the 4 letter word (Iraq) but was swotted away a bit too easily. Great one liner though re the passport for the daughter.

David Gray

50-50 on this guy on whether he still has it or not. Lots of fun tweets re his ‘shakey head’.

Saoirse Ronan

Closest it came to Tubridy Tonight was this interview, maybe a little too light and some inane questions but it was still kind of fun. Very likeable young lady who will do very well was the Twitter consensus. Her only PR blunder was her plug for Walkers crisps. Sharp intake of breath from the audience.

Niall and Gillian Quinn

Good interview to finish off though lacked some depth maybe. Niall got the EVIL look of the night from GQ (cool initials, btw) for his inference re the night they met. Very funny stuff. I still think this guy is a legend for giving away STG£1M to charity from his testimonial game. Little blip at the end with the band but it didn’t spoil what was a great opening show.

So, Ryan Tubridy’s breakfast on Saturday tasted very good indeed. Spare a thought for his invisible production team who also must have put in a lot of hard slog to get the quality line up and great questions to ask.

Now, the question is: can they keep it going? It will be tough keeping the guest quality high and avoiding the ‘filler’ guests (you know who they are…) that were such a feature of the previous incarnation.

Tune in next week on RTE and on Twitter (might we be so bold to recommend the #latelate version of the hashtag?) to see how this story develops. And… we’ll all love that theme tune by Christmas :)

Oh yeah…

Tweet of the night came from @reverbstudios

“Holy shit, what’s all this Late Late show spam in my twitter..I’ve a good mind to unfollow you all..!”