![\"Not](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0c35b101-577a-473f-830d-9b674a063a4c.jpg\")
<\/p>\nTraitors fan favourite, Paudie Moloney, has revealed it was his plan to play the \u201cdaddy and granddad\u201d role in the game.<\/p>\n
Paudie (68), a former prison officer from Kilmallock, Co Limerick, who was the last original traitor, was banished from Slane Castle yesterday.<\/p>\n
Speaking to RT\u00c9 Radio One\u2019s Oliver Callan show, he said he was \u201cdisappointed\u201d to say goodbye, but it\u2019s \u201cvery hard\u201d to last the entire game as a traitor.<\/p>\n
“I was disappointed, of course. I know it’s not impossible \u2013 you can survive from start to finish as a traitor, but it’s very, very hard,\u201d he said. “I got a good run, and I was happy with that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Limerick man said playing the \u201cdaddy and grandad role\u201d helped him throughout the show not to be detected as a traitor.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt times, they eased away from me for a while, and I think they kind of said to themselves: \u2018[He\u2019s] probably harmless\u2019. As to whether they underestimated me or not in that sense, I don’t know, because I wasn’t a threat to anybody in there. And that’s the way I liked it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Paudie revealed he is a \u201chugger\u201d in real life, following the viral moment from the show when traitors had to murder a player by hugging them.<\/p>\n
Upon learning the task, Paudie said at the time: \u201cI\u2019m not being f***ing smart here right, but I\u2019m not a f***ing hugger.\u201d Later, his fellow Traitor, Nick, who was recruited by Paudie, gave Christine a hug of death.<\/p>\n
Paudie told RT\u00c9: \u201cI am a hugger, to be honest. The grandkids were all onto me: \u2018What are you saying, granddad? You are a hugger.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving said that, I wasn’t really a hugger in the castle. So had I hugged somebody in the castle, I think they\u2019d have just [spotted] it straight away. So I was happy enough that Nick would take that,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
When asked about the audience reaction and the \u201cPaudie fever\u201d, he said this is all \u201cvery new to him\u201d.<\/p>\n
“I wouldn’t be that kind of outgoing person like that, so it’s all very new to me, but I’m enjoying it.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are very nice and very good, and they come up and they talk to me, the strangers calling me Paudie, and I’m quite happy to just salute and say hello and have a chat.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn’t a performance, it genuinely wasn’t. It was me being me, and I tried to flow through it as best I could, as best in the background as I could.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven though you try to stay back, you’re going to be brought forward so and that’s how it happened,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Limerick native said it was \u201cbrilliant\u201d to have his son, Andrew, with him in the game.<\/p>\n
“It was almost like still being in touch with home in a lot of ways, in that stressful environment.<\/p>\n
“When I recruited him, obviously, a lot of people said my decision was wrong, but I did it with the best of intentions,\u201d he said, adding he was \u201cvery disappointed\u201d when Andrew was banished from the castle.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Not really like father, like son – Paudie is a master traitor, unlike his banished boy, Andrew: The Traitors Ireland’. Photo: RT\u00c9<\/p>\n
Andrew also accidentally called Paudie \u201cdaddy\u201d during one of the missions, almost giving away that they are related.<\/p>\n
“I nearly turned around,\u201d Paudie said. \u201cBut my neck is so stiff at the moment. My neck isn’t great, so I think I couldn’t turn around. I just copped it in time, stopped myself. So that was the close one.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also believes his 30 years of experience working in prison have “without a doubt\u201d prepared him to join the Traitors game.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn prison, you react to situations, and I reacted to an awful lot of situations in there without even feeling that reaction. You’re in that kind of mode where you are heightened, and you are watching what you say, and it just seemed to come naturally.<\/p>\n
“Working in prison is a stressful job. There’s no getting away from that. And for anybody that’s worked there, they’ll know that.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut inside, in the castle, when you are watching your back, you’re watching every word you say. You’re watching other people’s reactions to what you say, and you don’t know [if] you [made] a boo boo there.<\/p>\n
“And there was one or two boo boos along the way. You’re kind of fighting to survive, if you like. So it was very, very stressful. It really was.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Traitors fan favourite, Paudie Moloney, has revealed it was his plan to play the \u201cdaddy and granddad\u201d role…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70904,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75],"tags":[7699,18,117,19,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-70903","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-adrianna-wrona","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}