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Saoirse Ronan and Stephen Colbert Talk Irish Accents

By Irish America Staff
January 13, 2016

January 13, 2016 by Leave a Comment

Saoirse Ronan stopped by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert this week. The Irish starlette did her best to teach Stephen a thing or two about the Irish accent.

Irish actress Saoirse Ronan appeared on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert this week and the two enjoyed a lightly jibing conversation about Irish accents and the difficulty of pronouncing Irish names.

Ronan, who was on the show to promote her new movie Brooklyn, in which she stars as an Irish girl who moves to the titular borough in the 1950s, obliged to teach Colbert how to speak with an Irish accent during the interview after the host affectionately attempted to imitate hers.

“Americans love Irish people,” Colbert said with a minor brogue that Ronan picked up on. The two went back and forth through the stereotypes of the high-pitched sing-songy Irish and the opposite gruff baritone of the aged Irishman before Colbert finally got Ronan’s approval.

After his accent success, Colbert, a devout Catholic for whom 15 of his 16 great-grandparents were Irish, brought out the name cards and had Ronan help him and the audience with Irish spelling and pronounciation of common names like Tadhg, Siobhan, Caoibhe, and Oisin, and of course Saoirse (rhymes with “inertia,” Ronan helped).

Watch the whole interaction below:

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