32 children will represent their county in the Toy Show Parade

#LateLateToyShow

It's Toy Show Day and the final day of a week of Christmas programming announcements in which the theme of this year’s Late Late Toy Show has been revealed as Christmas movie favourite Home Alone!

Make sure you’re not on a flight to Paris shouting ‘Kevin!’ this Friday night and join Patrick Kielty and a host of little Kevin McCallisters and Wet Bandits as they come together to protect the McCallister home! Run, Run Rudolph, this is the most magical time of the year and the best night to bring your family together for ‘eating junk and watching The Late Late Toy Show’ – and no one is going to stop you!

In true ‘I made my family disappear’ style, there’ll be plenty of mischief with staircase sliding, snowball throwing, Wicked performances, and lots of rocking around the Christmas tree.  This year’s Late Late Toy Show, with all 250 toy testers and performers, promises to be a night of surprises that will warm your heart and take you out of this world making wishes come true.

Speaking ahead of tonight Patrick Kielty said, “I am so excited to be bringing Home Alone to all the kids of Ireland tonight. It’s the dream movie theme for me, when I walked out onto the set earlier this week it brought a tiny tear to my eye. The big kids are going to love the nostalgia around it. Take a nap before we get started, because tonight is going to epic!”

A stunning set created by RTÉ production designers will take the big kids among us back in time to Kevin’s kitchen, his sitting room, the treehouse and not forgetting Buzz’s bedroom; The Late Late Toy Show will be giving nineties nostalgia. There will be surprises revealed all throughout the night as we also mark the fifth year of the Toy Show Appeal; more than 1.1 million children, young people and their families in every county on the island of Ireland have been impacted by this funding.

A first for The Late Late Toy Show, kids from every county in Ireland will take to the studio floor to show their pride for their county in the Toy Show County Parade! Expect swirling and twirling, gymnastics and pageantry, Marshal Kielty will attempt to keep all 32 kids in their line!

In fashions Kate McCallister would be proud of, the RTÉ Costume and Make-Up Departments have been working diligently to create the world of this Chicago Christmas wonderland while children from all across Ireland will be entertaining audiences on Friday night with the games they’ve been playing such as the Beyblade X Xtreme Battle Set, Hot Wheels Monster Truck Epic Loop Bundle, and the cute and cuddlies FurReal Peanut the Playful Monkey and Real FX Disney Stitch Puppet Interactive Toy.

The much-loved book section of the show will see our readers sharing mythologies and histories; reviewing The Dictionary Story by Oliver Jeffers, The Story of Irish Rugby by Gerard Siggins and Nina Peanut: Mega Mystery Solver by Sarah Bowie.

Irish toys they’ve been playing and creating with include Stomp Rockets and an Irish Bracelet Weaving set to name a few. A list of the toys featured will be available on the show’s website www.rte.ie/latelate following the broadcast. All toys featured on the night will be donated to charities.

RTÉ Player

Stream Free Worldwide  

In 2023, a global audience from 158 countries tuned in to watch The Late Late Toy Show on RTÉ Player, with viewers from London to New York, Toronto, Madrid, Amsterdam, Berlin, Sydney and Auckland.

Stream The Late Late Toy Show tonight on RTÉ Player at 9:35pm and catch-up or rewatch on demand.

Subscribe to The Late Late Show YouTube channel for all of the best bits.

RTÉ Social Channels

Catch all the excitement from behind the scenes on the official social channels. RTÉ 2FM's Taran & Aindriú will host a 30-minute TikTok Live at 6.30pm on Friday, with AAA passes! They'll catch up with Patrick backstage, bring you on a tour of the set and meet the people who bring the greatest night of the year to life.

The official hashtag is #LateLateToyShow. You can follow the Late Late Show accounts right now to make sure you don't miss a single second of the greatest TV night of the year - @latelaterte on Tik Tok, @latelaterte on Instagram, @RTELateLateShow on X and @TheLateLateShow on Facebook.

ISL
The Late Late Toy Show with Irish Sign Language (ISL) will broadcast live on the RTÉ News Channel and RTÉ Player.  For the second year, our ISL coverage will feature Deaf presenters, Sarah-Jane O'Regan and Jason Maguire - working with hearing interpreters, Ciara Grant and Lisa Harvey-Coleman. The Late Late Toy Show ISL is a real celebration of Irish Sign Language, Ireland's third official language!  The Late Late Toy Sow ISL will be available to stream shortly after the live broadcast and will be repeated in the ISL block on Wednesday, 11th December.

Audio Description
Audio Description (AD) will also be available for the repeat show on Sunday 8th December at 15.05 on RTÉ One, and on Monday night at 24:05 and afterwards on RTÉ Player.  Audio Describers this year will be Clara Murray and Berni Stack.

The RTÉ Toy Show Appeal 

Working in collaboration with Community Foundation Ireland, the RTÉ Toy Show Appeal is back for its fifth year to improve the lives of children and their families by funding essential support, health, wellbeing, play, and creativity initiatives. It has so far raised an astonishing €21.3m and has provided support to 302 different charities and given 492 grants over that time. It supported 127 different children's charities last year alone and is estimated to have helped over 1.1 million annually since its inception.

The public can donate by going to www.rte.ie/toyshowappeal, or with the appeal’s official donation partner Revolut Pay.

The Late Late Toy Show airs tonight on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player at 9:35PM.

The Late Late Show is proudly sponsored by PTSB.

Further Information:

Jilly McDonough, RTÉ Press Officer