Paul Mescal has finally responded to the viral moment Saoirse Ronan shut down a conversation about women’s safety on The Graham Norton Show.

It was when the Irish actors were joined on the red sofa by Academy Award winners Eddie Redmayne and Denzel Washington that a joke about women and using phones as a defence tactic was tactfully shut down by Ronan.

The moment arose after Redmayne talked about his role as an assassin in the Sky Atlantic series The Day Of The Jackal, and he described how he was taught to use a phone in an attack, by thrusting it at an attacker’s throat.

That’s when Mescal, 28, joked: “Who is actually going to think about that? If someone actually attacked me, I’m not going to go ‘phone.’”

“That’s a very good point,” Redmayne said as they laughed and Graham Norton joined in.

Paul Mescal responded to the viral moment (BBC)

Ronan tried to interject a couple of times before she was able to chime in and say: “That’s what girls have to think about all the time. Am I right ladies?”

Now, Mescal has responded to the moment, after Ronan was praised for her remark.

The Gladiator actor was asked on Irish broadcaster RTE’s The Late Late Show if he was surprised by the response.

He said: “No, I don’t believe we were surprised, because you’re like, as you said, you’re on a talk show like this, and you’re kind of just talking.

“But I’m not surprised that the message received as much attention that it got, because it’s massively important and I’m sure you’ve had Saoirse on the show, like, she’s… quite often, more often than not, the most intelligent person in the room.

“But I think she… was spot on, hit the nail on the head, and it’s also good that … messages like that are kind of gaining traction, like that’s a conversation that we should absolutely be having on a daily basis.”

Thanks to that moment, Ronan was given a platform to explain why she spoke up.

Speaking to Ryan Tubridy on Virgin Radio UK, she addressed the response to the episode and said it ‘wasn’t something she expected’.

She said: “The reaction has been wild. It’s definitely not something that I had expected, and I didn’t necessarily set out to sort of make a splash.”

He agreed with the actress (243)

“But I do think there’s something really telling about the society that we’re in right now and about how open women want to be with the men in their lives.

“So many men and women that I know from all over the world have gotten in touch with me about this one comment, which is, again, I would urge people, please, please, please to watch this in context.”

She then went on to defend Redmayne and Mescal, explaining: “Please watch the whole interview or watch at least that part of the conversation, because it really wasn’t about… the boys weren’t sort of like debunking anything that I was saying.

“But at the same time, it felt very similar to like when I am at dinner with a bunch of my friends and I will always make the point that, well, this is actually an experience that we go through every single day, 100%.”

Because she and Mescal worked together during the filming of the film, Foe last year, they’re good pals.

She shared: “Paul being one of my very dear friends, I’ve had conversations like that with him before and he completely gets that and completely understands that but I think the fact that there was a moment like that that happened on a show like Graham Norton, which is something that the entire nation channels and to watch and even overseas, it’s something that people tune into.

“It seems to have had an accessibility which seems to have really gained traction, which I think is amazing.

“It’s opening a conversation and again, hopefully it’s allowing more and more women to just be like, well, yeah, actually, let’s talk about our experience.”

Featured Image Credit: BBC

Topics: BBC, Graham Norton, The Graham Norton Show, Celebrity,

No matter how hard we try to disguise it, sometimes, our bodies do the talking for us.

We can communicate a lot of emotions without uttering a word, as our posture, facial expressions and movements often manage to make our feelings quite clear.

So as people continue to discuss how Saoirse Ronan shut down Paul Mescal’s joke on The Graham Norton Show with a simple sentence, why don’t we also take a look at what she could have been saying with her body language, too?

US body language expert Patti Wood has shared her thoughts on what the Lady Bird star was really thinking when the actor made that joke on the BBC show.

For those who don’t know, Denzel Washington and Eddie Redmayne were also on the red couch on Friday (25 October) and the latter explained how he had learned self-defence from a specialist combat expert in preparation for his starring role in his new series, The Day of the Jackal.

The Oscar winner went on to add that he was taught how he could use his mobile phone to protect himself in a scary scenario, which came as quite the shock to Mescal.

The Gladiator star said: “Who is actually going to think about that? If someone actually attacked me, I’m not going to go ‘phone’.”

Wood told LADbible that Graham Norton and his guests initially seemed amused by the gag – but they then all ‘froze’ when Ronan interjected and explained: “That’s what girls have to think about all the time.”

So, what was the Irish actress thinking when she decided to correct Mescal when he made the comment?

Body language expert Patti Wood revealed what she reckons the actress was really thinking (BBC)

The body language expert reckons that Ronan didn’t break a sweat when she opted to speak up, as she remained ‘laid back, downward and still’ throughout the exchange.

Wood told LADbible she believes there are ‘several layers’ to her motivations for doing this, saying: “It’s clear she’s heard the story before, and she’s thought what she said out loud before.

“Now she’s in a place where she’s ready and wants to say it, and she savours it.

“You see the look on her face? You’ll see there’s a lack of symmetry, that one side of her face is showing one expression, and the other side is showing another expression.

“And part of what she’s showing is sort of a judgment, and then part of it is playfulness.

“She’s sure of herself as she says this, and yet she’s having to hold back how upset she is and the anger she has about the fact that women have to defend themselves all the time.”

Ronan has been praised by fans for shutting down Mescal’s joke (BBC)

The expert added: “I think that’s another reason why she took this moment – to make basically the entire world that watches entertainment news go, ‘Oh, my God. These guys are joking, this actor is joking about defending himself.

“He’s making a joke about having to use your phone to defend yourself as, ‘Oh, how silly that is’.

“When, in reality, women are always thinking about it.”

Discussing why Ronan might have turned to the audience and said, ‘Am I right, ladies?’, Wood said she believes it was only to make her point even clearer to the men she was sat alongside.

“She was so confident in that delivery, so it wasn’t like she needed the validation,” the expert said. “She didn’t shout out her answer. She delivered it with conviction. So that’s all of those things made it stronger.

“Her nonverbal behaviour was more like, ‘I am sure that I’m right, and I’m going to allow women to be able to affirm that this is a situation that we have to deal with’.

“The validation was not for her, it was more to make her message stronger for all the men.”