Siobhán McSweeney - Host

Series nine of The Great Pottery Throw Down is upon us. What can we expect?

It has all the things that you’ve grown to love. Really interesting challenges – the challenges this year have been really on point. I’ve been trying to copy loads of the challenges in my little kindergarten table that they put up for me backstage. And, as usual, we have a group of really, really lovely, very interesting and incredibly talented potters. What’s interesting this year is that they all seemed to be quite level. They all have different skills, but there’s quite a level playing field. with everyone having their own distinct style and their own strengths and weaknesses. So it was a really, really lovely lot this year. That’s a given. Potters, inexplicably, seem to be untainted by the nastiness of the rest of us.

There’s always such a diverse collection of personalities among the potters. Is that the case again this year?

Completely. In the past, we’ve found it hard to get certain demographics, because ceramics was being axed from school curriculums. So you were only getting a sample size of brilliant, extraordinary potters who either felt like it was their passion, and had found it and dedicated themselves to it, or people who had retired, and were able to dedicate that amount of time and money to it. But what’s really lovely this year is we seemed to have a bit more of an egalitarian demographic. 

Why was that the case?

People go “Show’s are just entertainment, it’s only for a bit of fluff, sitting down having your Sunday night tea in front of.” And it is that, and that’s deeply important, but what I think people don’t realise is how it has a real-life effect. What’s been wonderful is the amount of people over the years who have taken up pottery. I know pottery teachers who have said they now have waiting lists for their classes. 

Do you have any favourite challenges this year?

I do! From our showstopper challenges, I loved the one where they had to make a model theatre. Of course that’s a song to my dramatic heart. And they came up with such extraordinary things. When I saw the model theatres I thought: “Oh, little Siobhan would have loved playing with that!” And I got to do an internal high-five with little Siobhan, going: “Imagine, I get to play with the model theatres with these lovely potters.” So that was my favourite. 

What were the second challenges like?

We have extraordinary guest judges this year, who came in and did amazing things. We had Nick Mackman, whose work has such a beautiful ethos, focusing on endangered animals. She makes these extraordinary sculptures. We had Gabriel Nichols back, whose work speaks to the tradition of Stoke-on-Trent. There’s such an incredible, rich and impressive history and legacy of the place. We had Jo Taylor, and I actually bought one of her pieces, it’s amazing. [Siobhan produces an incredibly ornate vase from the table behind her]. It’s porcelain! And it’s almost like a mermaid’s vomited over it! It’s covered in shells and leaves and everything. She works incredibly organically. And then we had a mosaic challenge, with Cleo Mussi, who made extraordinary things. It was another way of dealing with ceramics that you wouldn’t automatically think of. It’s about cracking your old ceramic stuff and making new stuff out of it. I love that sustainability ethos. 

Gladstone Pottery, where the show is filmed, is so beautiful. Have you grown to have a real affection for the place?

Oh, I love it! It never had to grow – the instant I saw it, I loved it. We start very early in the morning, and you quite often get the last bit of the moon and Venus in the sky over the kiln, and I genuinely don’t think there’s anywhere nicer. And I’m from Ireland, you know? I know about nice places, and I still think there’s nowhere nicer. 

You’ve mentioned your ‘Play with Clay’ table set up during filming. What stuff did you make this year?

I produced such brilliant work. (I didn’t – they were all a mess!) But I did still manage to make egg cups. There’s a Pottery Throw Down book that I started working from. They have little challenges and tasks in that, so I made a couple of egg cups. And I made tiles. I made a grand total of two tiles. I did start with the aim of retiling the bathroom, so I think I’ll have to be doing the show a bit longer than I or the audience would want, just to get the bathroom re-tiled. 

You always have fun with the intro skits. I take it Rich was chomping at the bit to get involved…

[Laughs] Rich is like: “Am I wearing a costume?” And the amount of times we’ve had to break his heart, going “You’re not wearing a costume.” He’ll sulk for a little while. He’s an academic poet, the man is an artist, but all he wants to do is dress up and have a tail. He loves having a tail. We have great fun with the opening skits. It’s where I feel at home, because it’s closer to my acting background. I think there are a few good ones! Everyone loves them.  Keith’s always got great comic timing, he’s naturally very funny, so he’s always got a good spirit going into them. Rich just dives in head first. “What can I do? What can I do?” 

Do you ever have favourites among the potters?

It’s a very strange sensation. I’m very protective of them. What I didn’t realise, as a viewer, is that it’s quite a tough thing to ask somebody to do. It’s not asking somebody to sit down and make a pot. These people don’t have media training. Some of them discover they have an affinity for it, and some of them discover they don’t mind it, but not all of them. You need to let them forget about the cameras, but also they can’t forget too much about the cameras, it’s sort of a delicate balance. I feel incredibly protective of them that way. I’ll tease them so they relax a little, because then they make their best work, and that’s what we want. We want them to be safe, first of all, and then we want them to do work that they really feel that they are proud of. That, whatever happens, they can leave and go “I tried my best, under insane circumstances.” I love them. It sounds a bit pat, but it’s true. 

There seem to be some potters who you can really mess around with, and others who might want to be left alone to do their work…

Completely, that’s exactly it. A lot of them discover that they really want to play. It takes a while to find out who are the ones, so you test the waters a bit. Some of them find it just gives them a bit of energy for the next bit. One of our contestants this year was one of the ones that I has the most amount if play with, but all of his play was “Go away!” “Don’t want to talk to you!” And his timing was immaculate. 

It's a very emotional show…

Inexplicably, it’s an emotional show. Who knew?

Do you get swept up in that? Do you feel emotional while you’re filming?

I’d say I’m ‘emotional-adjacent’. It doesn’t serve the potters or the show if I become emotional. I’m there to protect my potters, and to ensure that everybody is okay, and having a good time, and that they have the information they need. So when you’re in that sort of surveillance and protective mode, you can’t allow yourself to get emotional.. Then I get backstage and I’m like “Oh my God!” All of our potters, the generosity they show us, not only with their work, but in what they show us of their personal lives, is an incredibly generous thing to do. We are so cynical and jaded now, we think it must have something to do with personal benefit. There’s no personal benefit to these people sharing things about themselves, about their feelings, about their work, about their past, about their hopes. We always end up with such generous people. Aren’t we lucky?

That generosity of spirit, the warmth and kindness that the show embodies, seems in short supply just now. Do you think that makes shows like this all the more important?

I do, of course. I’m a big believer in broad entertainment. I think broad entertainment is really important, for allowing our little brains to breathe a little. And to share in a communal experience, where loads of other people are watching as well. What’s been extraordinary about our show is that more and more and more people are watching it each year. What I love is that people sit down as a family on a Sunday to watch it. But I feel a family communality, sitting down collectively, is so important. Whatever your family looks like, whether it’s a bunch of friends or whatever, sitting down to collectively experience something is really valuable. Terrestrial TV can give you a really good shared experience. 

If I said to you that you could take home and keep one single make from all your time on the show, what would you choose?

I can’t do that! Nooo! I can’t do that! No, and I won’t do that,. I wouldn’t do that. No. NO! I will tell you, I tend to copy a lot of things. If I see them do something I like, I’ll try it out. I remember last year, Diana did, just at the bottom of one of her sculptures of her house, she just pinpricked this surfeit of dandelions, and then put a certain glaze into it, and oxides, and it came out beautifully. And I was obsessed with that, and kept trying to do that. I find the potters inspirational more than I want any of their stuff. 

The last year has also seen you hosting The Traitors Ireland. What was that experience like?

Insane! Oh my God, absolutely insane. I loved it.

Was it as big over there as the UK one was here?

I think bigger. Which was unexpected, to say the least. It was really big. It was an utter triumph. They did brilliantly. There was a beautiful interest in it, and loads of lovely things came out of it. I loved it.

Do you take a very different approach to the two shows, or is it more about just going on and being yourself?

They’re never about going on and being myself. I can’t do that. I couldn’t. Euch! It has to be a version. My pottery persona is this idiot clown who doesn’t know anything about pottery, and who wants to have the chats, and who is as curious as the audience is about what people are doing. My Traitors persona, we call her Lady Muck. She’s sort of this stern, eccentric, glamorous lady of the manor. 

Between Throw Down and Traitors, you’ve become something of a fashion icon. Is that a label you embrace?

No, of course not! But the one thing I will accept is that I’m very average-looking, and when Pottery started, I had hundreds of messages every day, from women saying variations of the same thing, and it still breaks my heart, because it’s such a poignant thing to say: “Hi. I look just like you, but you look lovely.” And it just gave me a huge insight into the things that we don’t say out loud. So I make it a point that I only ever wear something that, anyone who is my size can go into a shop and get it. 

Lastly, what is the best thing about presenting Throw Down?

It’s always the same answer. It’s the potters. Because the rest of us remain the same. We’re so lucky now, we have such an amazing crew and production team that everyone always wants to come back. Even runners, who usually do one year and move on, that’s part of their apprenticeship in the industry – this year we had the same runners, because they all wanted to come back. It’s an incredibly pleasant work environment. But we all stay the same. The thing that keeps bringing us back is “What will the potters be like this year? What will they do? What will be the craic?” It has to be that.