Former Republic of Telly star Kevin McGahern has said he “regrets” making fun of people on the sketch show – admitting he went "too far" with some of his jokes on the show.
McGahern hosted the RTE2 sketch show from 2013 until it was cancelled in 2017.
Reflecting about his time on the show, he said he regrets making fun of fellow stars including Ryan Tubridy and Ray D’Arcy, saying at times, he went too far with his slagging.
He said: “Yeah, we probably went too far sometimes but like when the pressure’s on and you have to make literally your director is like ‘okay you have to make fun of this show’, you don’t think about people’s feelings until years later when you meet them at an awards show and they shake your hand a little bit too tight.
“You sort of pass them in the corridor.. weirdly enough it didn’t happen that often and sometimes you put people into sketches like you would put Dave Fanning into a sketch but like you’d never make fun of Dave Fanning.
“Our targets were mostly (Ryan) Tubridy, (Ray) D’Arcy, Maura (Derrane) and Daithí(O Se) they were kind of very quick to laugh at themselves. I would go down to their show and do it to their face so they were grand.
“But then as soon as I started hosting other shows, people online started criticising me and insulting me. It made me feel so bad about what I did to Tubridy and D’Arcy.”
Kevin donned plenty of sequins during his time on Dancing With The Stars – and the Cavan native admitted he wouldn't like being poked fun at by someone else on Republic of Telly.
“When I was on the show, I was such a little w**ker and, every week to make fun of shows and sometimes when you didn’t really want to… so the idea of like ‘yes another younger version of me’ on Republic of Telly, I would hate that.”
The father-of-two was booted off Dancing With The Stars on Sunday night with his pro dance partner Laura Nolan, narrowly missing out on this week’s final.
Speaking afterwards, he said he was “happy” with his experience but said he felt a slight sense of relief to be out of the show, admitting he had moments of panic and anxiety in rehearsals.
“I’m very happy with my experience. I met an amazing person (Laura Nolan). She is an incredible dancer and an incredible teacher and a friend.
"There are times where I needed emotional support, there’s times where I was really struggling with anxiety and performing and Laura sat me down and basically became a therapist and a counsellor and I was so grateful for that.
“It’s nice to go out feeling like you’ve done your best.
“I’d be lying if I didn’t say there’s a large part of me that thinks that’s a relief. It’s such a stressful show…a huge amount of work goes into it so part of me is looking forward to not doing it but I would’ve loved to have gotten to the final because myself and Laura have worked very hard.
“My goal from the start was ‘okay, I’ll do the show, I just don’t want to be first knocked out' and then when I got past the first week, I was like I would love to get to dedication week and then I got to dedication week, I’d love to do orchestra week. You get greedy.
“I’m quite pleased with the progress I made.
“Last week I had full on performance anxiety. You know in the movies when somebody goes out on stage and their mouth dries up and you see the flashbulbs of reporters and you freeze – it was literally that.
“I would’ve hated to go out last week.”
But he said he was blown away by the public’s support.
“Yeah, not really like you don’t really know how the public will vote so you just try to focus on the dance. "You try not to think of the votes or the scores… but I was blown away by the public vote, especially last week when we were bottom of the scoreboard, and we weren’t in the dance off, so we must’ve got serious support.”
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