Paul Mescal congratulated his friend Saoirse Ronan For talk about women’s safety in a viral clip from The Graham Norton Show, saying she “hit the nail on the head.”

Both Oscar nominees appeared on BBC A talk show, in which Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne spoke about his training for his role as a lone assassin in the Sky Atlantic series The Day Of The Jackal, and how he was taught to use a phone during an attack.

In response, Mescal, 28, said: “If someone attacks me, I won’t go (put my hand in my pocket) to the phone,” before Ronan intervened and said: “This is what girls need to think about all the time. Am I right, ladies?

The clip received a lot of attention on social media and Mescal was asked on Irish broadcaster RTE’s The Late Late Show if they were surprised by the reception.

He said, “No, I don’t think we were surprised, because, like you said, you’re on a talk show like this, and you’re just talking.

“But I’m not surprised that the post received as much attention as it did, because it’s extremely important and I’m sure you’ve had Saoirse on the show, like, she’s… quite often, the more often, the smartest person in the room.

Ronan said the woman has “somehow, throughout her life as a woman, acquired these tools without ever talking to other women about them and without ever understanding that they are ‘a sort of survival tactic’.

“We all subconsciously find the same tools and use them over and over again and I find that really interesting,” she added.

Normal People star Mescal, who was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for the drama Aftersun, is currently starring in the highly anticipated blockbuster Gladiator II.

Ronan appeared in The Outrun, about a woman struggling with alcoholism, earlier this year.

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