PAT KENNY HAS admitted that he doesn’t miss the Toy Show at all, but says he still cherishes the memories of his tenure as presenter.
The veteran broadcaster retired his Christmas jumper in 2009 after handing over the Late Late Show reins to current host Ryan Tubridy.
Kenny left TV in 2013 to do radio full time on Newstalk, but will return to TV screens next year as part of UTV Ireland’s new roster of presenters. But does that mean he’ll be open to doing a UTV Toy Show? Well…no.
Speaking to DailyEdge.ie yesterday, he said he didn’t miss helming the Irish Christmas institution, and most children these days don’t realise he ever did:
Yesterday, a child looked at me in total mystification while her sister shouldered her and said ‘Mam’ – and the thing was the younger sister had never seen me do the Toy Show while the older sister had.
He said he didn’t catch this year’s Toy Show on the night (he was at a Christmas party) – but he knows he couldn’t match Ryan Tubridy’s passion for singing and dancing.
When you’re doing things like that you are immersed in them… I have done everything from riding the back of an elephant and trudging through snow in Lapland to meet Santa, so you keep those memories. I’m not sure I could rival Ryan in the song and dance department.
And what if UTV Ireland did a Toy Show? Would he be involved?
It’s a firm ‘no’.
Well, I won’t be doing it. That’s for sure. No, when you do 10 Toy Shows there comes a time when you say, “Yeah, I’ve done as much as I can.”
“There are only so many Batman outfits you can go through,” he added. “I’ll leave that to some of the other presenters.”
Additional reporting by Sinead O’Carroll
