Podcast Corner: Heffernan and O'Mahony back together for new show
Rob Heffernan and Laura O'Mahony have launched Red Raw.
“How did we end up here,” ask Olympian Rob Heffernan and comedian Laura O’Mahony at the start of their new show, which debuted last week. Former co-hosts on the Red FM breakfast show, their rapport is clear from the off - it wasn’t always like that; as Heffernan says: “Imagine getting to know someone on mic and on air and it’s pure unnatural.”
Their exit from the Cork station had been announced early in the summer on the news that KC was returning to morning hosting duty. On Red Raw, they address how they came to work together and how it came to an end. “I was gutted,” admits Heffernan. “I was roaring crying,” says O’Mahony, adding that it was “pulled out from under us”.
It sounds like they need this podcast as much as any former listeners who are missing the pair. The opening episode acts as a juicy look behind the curtains, but now the hard work starts - will Red Raw be able to stand on its own feet, distinct from their breakfast show days? Time will tell.
We’ve written about Missing Pages before, when it began back in August 2022, an investigative podcast into the books industry, from the ‘cautionary tale’ of Kaavya Viswanathan to Anna March, a notorious figure who racked up big bills in the service of literature - and left others to pay them. Season two begins with one of the biggest names in books at the moment, Colleen Hoover, whose story begins about 15 years ago when Amazon first allowed authors to self-publish and who exploded in popularity during the covid lockdowns - mainly thanks to #booktok.
Host and literary critic Bethanne Patrick seeks to understand the Hoover hoopla, pondering whether it’s indicative of a changing landscape where publishing gatekeepers are losing power while readers are gaining power.
One literary sensation of recent years is Jeanette McCurdy, whose strikingly titled, best-selling memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died, tells a story of the troubles of a child actor, from eating disorders to addiction to family pressures. Her new podcast, Hard Feelings, comprises short episodes clocking in at under 20 minutes. As she explains: “The thing is me fucking talking. I’m just talking into a phone. I’m literally just sharing in real time whatever the emotion is that’s most on my mind in that moment while I’m in the middle of that emotion.”
