Saoirse Ronan breaks silence on viral BBC The Graham Norton Show moment and Paul Mescal's response

Saoirse Ronan has broken her silence after THAT viral Graham Norton moment – and revealed what Paul Mescal thinks about it. On BBC The Graham Norton Show on Friday, Ronan went viral by shutting down Mescal and Eddie Redmayne while they joked about protecting themselves from potential attackers using a mobile phone.

Speaking to Ryan Tubridy on Virgin Radio UK on Wednesday morning, the star 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. 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. 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."

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She said: “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%.”

On the topic of Paul, the actress added: “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. I met a woman last night who's working on Blitz, and she said that, you know, it's really interesting, after we watched that interview, myself and a few of my female friends were with my husband and we said, you know, this really reminds me of the fake phone call.

“And her husband went, what, fake phone call? What do you mean? And of course, you wouldn’t understand if you’ve not had to go through anything like that. But she somehow, throughout her life as a female, has gained these tools without ever talking to other women about it and understanding that this is sort of a survival tactic.

“And we've all sort of like subconsciously found the same tools and use them again and again and I find that really interesting.”