RTE Late Late viewer boost after New Year's Eve special despite mixed reaction
Patrick Kielty hosted a New Year's Eve special last Sunday but there will be no show on the air this Friday night
RTE's Late Late Show New Year's Eve special attracted a huge number of viewers despite a mixed reaction to the guest list and no countdown to midnight.
Patrick Kielty hosted his first New Year's special last Sunday with Teenage Dirtbag hitmakers Wheatus, Oscar-winning actor James Martin, comedian Gearoid Farrelly and singers Maverick Sabre, Midge Ure, Niamh Kavanagh and Allie Sherlock among the guests.
The show went toe to toe with Graham Norton's New Year's Eve special on the BBC. The Cork man's show featured US actors Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo among the guests.
RTE has revealed that the Late Late Show performed very well with an average of 531,000 viewers tuning in to the show live on RTE One and RTE One +1 on Sunday.
This was a marked increase in viewers from the shows screened in the regular Friday night slot in the run up to Christmas. While the Take That special in early December attracted over half a million viewers, only 380,000 and 395,000 switched on respectively in the following two shows last month.
The New Year's special was met with a mixed reaction from viewers with some hailing it as "brilliant" and others labelling it "woejus."
Many viewers took to X, formerly Twitter, to give their take on the special show.