Gay Byrne, TV star who 'challenged Irish society', di aged 85 | Ireland | The Guardian

Contents:

• GAY BYRNE: ‘I AM NO DIFFERENT TO HUNDREDS OF THOANDS OF PEOPLE WHO LOST MONEY’
• THE WOMEN BEHD GAY BYRNE’S SUCCS: WHO THEY WERE AND WHAT THEY DID
• GAY BYRNE OBUARY: THE MATRO OF IRISH BROADSTG
• GAY BYRNE
• GAY BYRNE
• DETAILS OF GAY BYRNE'S WILL HE MA JT 12 DAYS BEFORE HIS ATH REVEALED
• GAY BYRNE, TV STAR WHO 'CHALLENGED IRISH SOCIETY', DI AGED 85
• GAY BYRNE(1934-2019)
• GAY BYRNE, VETERAN IRISH BROADSTER, AD AT 85
• GAY BYRNE TO RECEIVE COUNSELLG AFTER INTERVIEW WH STEPHEN FRY
• ON THIS DAY: IRISH TV AND RAD PRENTER GAY BYRNE BORN DUBL
• GAY BYRNE’S CRECHE OWNER DGHTER CRONA SAYS ‘GROWN WOMEN CRYG DOWN PHONE AT NIGHT’ OVER CHILDRE DTRY CRISIS
• GAY BYRNE, WHO TACKLED TABOOS AS IRELAND’S TV HOST, DI AT 85

GAY BYRNE: ‘I AM NO DIFFERENT TO HUNDREDS OF THOANDS OF PEOPLE WHO LOST MONEY’

Gay Byrne may have sat at or near the top of the TV ratgs for most of his half-century broadstg but his fancial health was far ls nsistent. Was there an army of women Gay Byrne’s rner?

THE WOMEN BEHD GAY BYRNE’S SUCCS: WHO THEY WERE AND WHAT THEY DID

Any further e of this image mt be re-negotiated separately wh RTÉ Mra ConnollyGay Byrne’s special assistant and programme executive 1968-1999Mra Connolly worked wh Gay Byrne for more than 30 years, a role enpassg rearcher, artist liaison, stage manager, dience warm-up, troublhooter.

GAY BYRNE OBUARY: THE MATRO OF IRISH BROADSTG

“Gay would always, verg an em, give a cred on air to the producer who rearched , mentng Pan or Mary or Colman. Money rolled towards the surgery (cludg quiz entrants sendg a £1 each; “we lled him the ln dollar kid”, and the remag money started the Gay Byrne Show Fund).

I had to sell to Gay, and eventually he went for . Audrey Hepburn was another he got ill, “Gay said I don’t want to talk about . They were a tower of strength to Gay.

GAY BYRNE

In a highly creative environment, tempers n go, but Gay was not that sort of person. ”Gay Byrne prentg his fal Late Late 1999. Eventually Sbhán sat down and I shed on to the set shoutg to you, ‘Gay quick!

Photograph: RTÉ Stills Library Colette FarmerProductn assistant, later director, of the Late Late Show, between 1964 and 1999Gay Byrne’s regular ll-out on the Late Late, “Roll there Colette”, beme a tchphrase and passed to Irish idm. Colette was Colette Farmer, productn assistant, and an visible prence, through Gaybo’s reference, on the show for many years. In 1991, Farmer beme a TV director, workg on shows om Cursai to Simply Delic, and directed the Late Late Show om 1992 to 1999, cludg Byrne’s last Late “Roll there Colette”, beme “Roll there Rois”, when Rois Hark was image of Gay Byrne projected on to Cy Hall Dubl, as part of the St Patricks day Ftival 2007.

Photograph: David Sleator/The Irish Tim Alice O’SullivanGay Byrne Show rearcher 1989-97; Late Late rearcher 1999. “Gay was my mentor and my iend.

GAY BYRNE

I really learned all about life workg on the Gay Byrne Show.

Women were maly his dience [on the rad] and was all about the dience for Gay.

It opened the floodgat, the secrets people were wrg to Gay. ”She rells briefg Byrne before he terviewed Graham Norton, explag he was the new boy, that the big al growg up Bandon was not that he was gay but that he was prottant; mentng that he was nervo.

DETAILS OF GAY BYRNE'S WILL HE MA JT 12 DAYS BEFORE HIS ATH REVEALED

“When Graham was oppose Gay live, was my brief he was repeatg.

GAY BYRNE, TV STAR WHO 'CHALLENGED IRISH SOCIETY', DI AGED 85

”Gay Byrne and Ehne Hand Ehne HandRad producer and wrer.

Gay Byrne Show rearcher 1990-1994; producer of Byrne's s Sunday Jazz programme on Lyric FM 2013-2016Ehne Hand, who worked briefly on the Late Late Show, on Byrne’s rad show and on his Lyric show, don’t thk he had any particular affy for women’s issu but “he wanted as many people as possible to listen to that show. It was the producers and the rearchers who cid what was on the programme each morng” says: “Gay told me very recently that he learned almost all he ever knew about women’s rights and femism om June Leve, ” when she was a Late Late rearcher. We weren’t tryg to be a woman’s programme but Gay had a voice and a style that appealed, the listeners loved him, wanted to tell him all sorts of thgs, and they were mostly women.

“I thk Gay did like that. Rearcher on Gay Byrne Show for a year the journalist observed 2014: "It is not to say, eher, that Byrne was ever a sat.

GAY BYRNE(1934-2019)

”This article was amend on November 11th, 2019, to clarify a reference to the “Roll there Colette” phrase ed by Gay Byrne. Patrick Freyne looks back at the reer of the multi award-wng broadster Gay Byrne.

Stills: The Irish Tim/ As creded Gay Byrne Born: Augt 5th, 1934 Died: November 4th, 2019Gay Byrne, who has died at the age of 85, was the undisputed leadg figure the history of Irish broadstg, and played a hugely fluential role the transformatn of attus the latter part of the 20th a reer that spanned six s, he was father figure, nfsor, quisor and entertaer, all rolled to one. Both parents were om Co Wicklow, his father om Kildry (where Gay Byrne’s grandfather was achman to the Earl of Meath) and his mother om Bray. It was partly for this reason that the young Gay Byrne never got close to him.

GAY BYRNE, VETERAN IRISH BROADSTER, AD AT 85

She was termed that her children would better themselv and sent Gay to sendary regular e om Guns’s ma the fay more fortunate than many others. Mr Moynihan was so pleased wh young Gay Byrne’s performance that he gave him a threepenny those the stud thought of the boy who, the future, would revolutnise Irish broadstg, remas unknown. She had promised to go to Mass and Communn every day if her hband me back safely om the first World War – they had married Belfast 1917 – which he daily Mass-gog eventually chafed wh the young Gay Byrne and at the age of 14 or 15 he had a ser row wh his mother durg which he said some extremely solent thgs to her.

By the time the uple fally married Saggart Parish Church 1964, their weddg was a celebry event, wh a crowd of more than a thoand gatherg the Dubl village to tch a glimpse of the newlyweds, who need a Garda rt to get to their a broadster, Gay Byrne, or Gaybo, as he me to be known, saw his populary as fickle and as somethg that uld disappear at the whim of the dience. The girls who flocked to the ballrooms uld, if they beme pregnant, fd themselv shut to a mother and baby home for up to two years, spendg their time scbbg floors and workg the kchens, their nam changed, their right to munite wh the outsi world cut off, their babi taken om them to be sent to Ameri on a few hours’ Gay Byrne – who was very well aware of the existence of that other Ireland – chipped away and away at , lethally on The Late Late Show, brgg on, for stance, guts who champned the right of unmarried mothers and their babi to be treated cently by the the old Ireland stepped – and had plenty of reprentativ RTÉ, polics and the civil service – to sist that The Late Late Show stick to “safe” entertament, the story of Gay Byrne would probably be of ltle tert to today. Neverthels, his survival was a remarkable achievement for the boy who got a ser beatg over givg cheek to his mother bee he didn’t want to go to great ntradictn of Gay Byrne, of urse, was that so many of his views he was nservative, though he did so much to unrme the very nservative approach which had characterised Irish life well to the 1960sHe did make one apology which he regretted was the Bishop and the Nightie affair, when he asked a woman the dience what she had worn on her weddg night.

GAY BYRNE TO RECEIVE COUNSELLG AFTER INTERVIEW WH STEPHEN FRY

Gay Byrne brought to an end wh what he later scribed as a “half” apology.

ON THIS DAY: IRISH TV AND RAD PRENTER GAY BYRNE BORN DUBL

But he didn’t feel good about and he cid he would never aga apologise when he had done nothg enough, he was probably the only one who remembered years later that he had apologised: all the public remembered was that a bishop had ma a fool of himself over a harmls joke by a woman about her weddg Gay Byrne Show, the rad programme which brought him to the natn’s kchens every weekday morng, started 1972 and ran until 1998. They ntaed the prevly untold, heartrendg experienc of many women Ireland at the great ntradictn of Gay Byrne, of urse, was that so many of his views he was nservative, though he did so much to unrme the very nservative approach which had characterised Irish life well to the took the view, for stance, that the untry was gog to the dogs enomilly and that State spendg was too high.

”This renred the loss of his money the Rsell Murphy affair all the more shockg – when emerged after Murphy’s ath 1984 that the acuntant had taken all the money which he had managed on Gay Byrne’s behalf and had left him bt. Worse, Murphy had been a close iend and Gay Byrne had seen him almost as a father blow was a grievo one to a man who nfsed to havg a sense of secury about his e, spe his great succs.

GAY BYRNE’S CRECHE OWNER DGHTER CRONA SAYS ‘GROWN WOMEN CRYG DOWN PHONE AT NIGHT’ OVER CHILDRE DTRY CRISIS

He ntued to appear on televisn, prentg the Irish versn of Who Wants to Be a Millnaire?, along wh seri such as The Gay Byrne Mic Show and Make ’Em Lgh (about edy Ireland), Gaybo’s Gmpy Men and Class beme a tirels and forceful advote for savg liv, appearg equently on rad and televisn, durg a perd which saw a dramatic fall road traffic fataliHis long-nng terview seri The Meang of Life clud a number of remarkable moments, cludg actor Gabriel Byrne’s admissn that he had been abed as a child and Stephen Fry’s nunciatn of God.

GAY BYRNE, WHO TACKLED TABOOS AS IRELAND’S TV HOST, DI AT 85

“I am not gog to say, bee would promise me terms of the show if people knew I had a posn, ” he 2006, he also prented Sunday afternoon shows on Lyric FM, where he displayed his encyclopaedic knowledge and ep love of classic jazz while lightg his substantial dience wh curmudgeonly asis about the state of 2014, he prented a documentary, Gay Byrne: My Father’s War about his father Edward’s service the 19th Royal Hsars durg the first World War, and his return to Ireland afterwards. Photograph: David Sleator Gay Byrne was diagnosed wh prostate ncer 2016 and he wrote and spoke publicly about the gellg nature of the chemotherapy treatment regime he was recently due to receive the Ireland-US Council’s Lifetime Achievement Award om Print Michael D Higgs, but was unable to attend the ceremony due to a broken wrist and cht fectn.