As fans of his show can attest, Seán Moncrieff comes across as a pretty chill guy. Whether covering offbeat curios such as stick-appreciation websites or dealing with contentious topics such as anti-Semitism, the host approaches his brief in a spirit of affably phlegmatic inquiry.
But occasionally the on-air persona cracks. During Tuesday’s discussion on Moncrieff (Newstalk, weekdays), with the reporter Henry McKean, about the phenomenon of “micropettiness” – defined as small acts of revenge, in case you’re wondering – Moncrieff is typically sparky. That is, until he reads out a listener’s text complaining about crockery being left unwashed.
“If you go into the microkitchen here in Newstalk, you will see an enormous mound of cups, and you will also see a dishwasher, which you can open and see is empty,” he says, his usual air of detached amusement rapidly evaporating. “They should have a training course here to tell people what a dishwasher is.”
So riled is the host that he becomes uncharacteristically tongue-tied, allowing McKean the chance to dish the dirt on a former colleague who got so annoyed by the sight of dirty china that he threw it in the bin. “That’s tantrum time,” Moncrieff remarks, gliding over his own fit of pique.
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Seán Moncrieff’s on-air persona cracks, and a dishwasher meltdown follows
It’s only a storm in a teacup, of course. Normal service is soon resumed, with Moncrieff chuckling while McKean chirpily fesses up to past acts of petty vengeance of his own, such as stealing a disliked flatmate’s cold can of cola each day. (Despite his mild-mannered exterior, Newstalk’s roving reporter is clearly not a man to cross.) Even if the host’s irritation is fleeting and somewhat theatrical, it’s also good to hear him getting properly exercised.
Moncrieff (who’s also a columnist for The Irish Times) doesn’t treat everything with studied irony: he regularly gets exasperated at the more ill-considered texts from his audience. But he can sound awkward if he has to venture beyond his usual range into more sensitive areas of human experience.
Talking to Patricia Oliver about her late son Joaquin, who was killed in the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, in 2018, the host is obviously sincere in his questions, yet he seems slightly uncomfortable at having to ask them.
Given the tragic circumstances, not to mention the jarring premise for his guest’s appearance – Oliver is promoting a video game to educate about school shootings – Moncrieff’s unease is understandable, but the interview doesn’t generate the emotional charge one might expect. (In fairness, it doesn’t help that news of this week’s appalling mass shooting in Sweden breaks as the item is aired.)
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He’s at his best when discussing ostensibly niche subjects that allow stimulating digressions. Wednesday’s conversation with the journalist Mary Kenny about her decision to (possibly) give up driving in her later years not only looks at the challenges of growing older but also throws up some intriguing sidebars. “I think the car liberated women terrifically,” Kenny suggests.
Likewise, an interview with the BBC’s technology editor, Zoe Kleinman, on an AI-generated book about herself (given as a gift by a friend) highlights the unnerving ability of such technology, as well as its occasionally comic shortcomings.
“I once asked ChatGPT about me,” Moncrieff recounts, “and it told me I’d written a series of bestselling cookery books and that I was an American woman. So that was a bit of an eye-opening revelation.”
When Moncrieff gets the right tone, the host always cleans up.
The formula for The Business (RTÉ Radio 1, Saturday) seems more straightforward than Moncrieff’s determinedly wayward style. But its presenter’s interviews regularly move beyond the professed business remit of Richard Curran’s magazine show, into politics, society and, in the case of the English fashion designer Bella Freud, psychology.
Curran’s guest has an illustrious family tree – her father was the painter Lucian Freud, and her great-grandfather was the pioneering psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud – though the conversation initially centres on her bohemian mother, Bernardine Coverley, whose parents were Irish.
It’s not the most naturally free-flowing encounter. Freud speaks in a deliberate, almost tentative manner, though she responds positively to her host’s questions, recalling her mother’s final days and talking frankly about her famous father: “He was a great dad but he wasn’t a reliable person.”
But when Curran asks about the “psychology of fashion”, a theme that Freud tackles in her regular podcast, the conversation takes a more diverting turn.
“I’ve always felt that clothes did a job that was bigger than their sum total,” the designer says with palpable passion. “If you could get your look right, you could be freed from self-consciousness; you could have your wits about you.”
It’s a rousing and thought-provoking take on fashion, an industry that Freud concedes is viewed by many (predominantly men, it’s probably fair to say) as cut-throat yet facile. “Actually, there are these amazing friendships and loyalties,” she says, “as well as all the fun bitchy stuff.”
It’s a good example of the wide-ranging approach that has seen The Business grow from a supposedly specialist programme to one of Radio 1’s most popular shows.
Curran doesn’t lose sight of his core mission, however. With Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on the EU, the host speaks to the Canadian-American journalist (and former speech writer for George W Bush) David Frum about the ramifications of the US president’s disruptive economic policies.
Perhaps inevitably, Frum paints a bleak picture, whether it’s questioning Trump’s ability to handle crises such as the pandemic – “His instincts to catch the ball are not good” – to the counterproductive effect of confronting friendly nations such as Canada or Denmark: “No one is so powerful as to dispense with the need for friends and allies.”
Closer to the bottom line, Curran’s guest points out that mass deportations could badly affect the US construction industry and other sectors that rely on migrant labour, and suggests that erecting trade barriers will harm the American economy: “Trump deeply believes in tariffs, and deeply doesn’t understand how tariffs work.”
Once again, the US president resembles a bull in a china shop: best make sure the breakables are safely stored.
Moment of the week
Part travelogue, part rumination, The Lyric Feature: Where the River Rises (RTÉ Lyric FM, Sunday) traces the course of the Avonmore river in the company of the poet and long-time Wicklow resident Jane Clarke. Starting in the Sally Gap, Clarke meets naturalists, ecologists and historians to draw an absorbing geographical, environmental and cultural portrait of the river, from the woodlands of Clara Vale to the agricultural archaeology of Lough Tay. An adept guide, Clarke also punctuates each stop with a suitably themed poem, while showing how the Avonmore has “shaped the landscape, the flora and fauna and, of course, the people”. Accessible without sacrificing authenticity or artistry, it’s a documentary that meanders enjoyably rather than babbling on, its neatly paced flow pulling the listener in.
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