Birth clip decision ridiculous - Lake

AMERICAN TV personality Ricki Lake has described the Late Late Show's decision not to show a clip of her giving birth as "ridiculous".

Lake said she was surprised when Ryan Tubridy indicated on Friday night’s show that he was going to show the clip, only to change his mind after consulting the studio audience.

The clip features the moment in which Lake gave birth to her son Owen in a bath at her New York apartment eight years ago. It is featured in The Business of Giving Birth, the film she made to promote home births.

During an interview with Lake, Tubridy said he had the clip and asked the audience whether they wanted to see it. Though he judged the reaction to be 50:50 and described childbirth as the “most natural thing in the world”, he declined to show it when pressed by Lake later in the interview.

Speaking at a conference organised by the Homebirth Association of Ireland in Dublin on Saturday, the former chat show host, who is now an advocate for home birth, said she did not understand why Tubridy “pulled the rug out”.

“He prepped like he was going to show it, and I said, ‘Wow, on late night TV you’re going to show nipples’, and then he kind of dissed me.

“There is nothing gross about it at all . . . I wouldn’t have a problem if he showed it. I don’t know why he set me up to set it up. It was strange how it was handled.”

Homebirth Association spokeswoman Krysia Lynch-Rybaczuk said RTÉ “bottled it” by not showing the clip. “What was the problem? Was it nudity or a woman giving birth as nature intended?”

An RTÉ spokeswoman said the clip was lined up to be shown, but the decision was taken during the show not to air it. “It wasn’t decided against for any particular reason except that the conversation changed direction and Ryan no longer felt it was appropriate to slot it in,” she said.