RTÉ HAS ISSUED an earlier-than-usual call out to children for applications to be part of what’s likely to be a very different looking Late Late Toy Show. 

“Normally we open the floodgates in September, but we are opening the floodgates now. If you want to be on the Toy Show, if you are a child and you think ‘I can sing I can dance, I can do mimicry, I can do magic, I am the chosen one in the entertainment world’, get in touch,” Late Late Show host Ryan Tubridy said this morning. 

Tubridy made the call-out for audition tapes on his RTÉ Radio One show. 

“You can be introverted, extroverted, upstairs, downstairs, inside, outside, it doesn’t matter, all you have to do is be a child. Before you know it, you can be talking to our elves, and you could be on The Late Late Toy Show,” he said. 

The show, usually an annual TV highlight for children and adults alike, will probably be forced to adapt – like so many others – to the pandemic-era. 

Various episodes of the Late Late Show were forced to air without an audience earlier this year and other social distancing measures were also introduced. 

The episodes saw guests appear either via video link or from a safe distance in a near-empty studio. 

Other shows in Ireland have also had face up to the realities of the Covid-19 virus. In July, RTÉ announced that Dancing with the Stars would be cancelled for 2021 because of the pandemic, with the national broadcaster planning to bring it back in 2022. 

“After much discussion, we feel the risks are too high with a production of this scale,” RTÉ’s Head of Entertainment John McHugh said last month. 

It remains to be seen how RTÉ and the Late Late Show will handle the frenetic Toy Show, which typically features live performances alongside a host of children demonstrating the latest toys. 

A spokesperson for RTÉ said that “as with all RTÉ programming, the programme will be made while adhering to RTÉ’s Working Safely on Site/Covid-19 protocols, in line with government and HSE guidelines”.