Hollywood actor Rupert Everett joined Patrick Kielty on Friday's Late Late Show Christmas Special - and the first thing he said to the show's host was: "You made me drunk!"
Patrick had mentioned that the last time they met for a TV show, "I ended up locking you in the Guinness factory," he recalled, with Rupert replying: "You made me drunk, as a matter of fact."
They quickly moved on to talk about Rupert’s new book, The American No. It's a selection of eight fictional stories he wrote love and loss, drama and glamour, hope and rejection.
As is often the case on The Late Late Show, there's an Irish connection.
"It was inspired by living in Carlow," Rupert explained. "I decided to move to Ireland at one point, when Brexit happened and Boris Johnson became prime minister. I thought: That’s enough. I’m moving to Ireland.
"And I have an Irish grandmother and I thought, this is it. I’ll get an Irish passport. Unfortunately, she was born in Rotherham, in England, and then she came to Ireland. And so I couldn’t get an Irish passport."
He also told Patrick about the background to one of the stories in his new book. "I’ve always wondered why Hollywood stars on their skids don’t sell their sperm," he said. "It seems such a rational and wonderful idea.
"Because, imagine, you could probably get millions of dollars for a couple. So my story is about a young actor . . . he can’t make it as actor and becomes an agent, and makes friends with this actor on the skids and he manages to sell his sperm to a Turkish supermarket owner’s wife.
"The supermarket owner is impotent and she desperately needs to have a child - it’s a very complicated story . . . so she gets impregnated by the star - but it gets discovered and all hell breaks loose."
Rupert also spoke to Patrick about the reality of show business and the endless rejection that’s part and parcel of the acting world. "You have to have a very, very thick skin to be in show business," he insisted.
Pointing towards Patrick he added: "On your side as well, there’s a lot of rejection. You have to find a way of digesting it and not letting it make you too angry."
"Show business is rather like doing business as a geisha," he added. "It’s full of rules and regulations, how you’re meant to behave."
Then he moved on to recall a recent experience with a hit Netflix show. "Emily in Paris, I really wanted to be in," he said. "Because it’s full of frothy Europeans who speak five languages.
"I speak a couple, and I thought: this could be me. I got a role and hopefully I’m going to be in next season. I’m really excited about that."
.svg)