Paul Mescal praised fellow Irish star and friend Saoirse Ronan for speaking out about women’s safety in a TV talk show clip that went viral.

The two Oscar nominees appeared on The Graham Norton Show, where Eddie Redmayne was talking about how he trained for his role as a lone assassin in Sky Atlantic series The Day Of The Jackal, where he was taught how to use a mobile phone if attacked.

In response, Mescal, 28, joked: “Who is going to think about that though?”

He continued:: “If someone attacks me I’m not going to go [reaches into pocket] phone.”

But Ronan chimed in and said: “That’s what girls have to think about all the time. Am I right ladies?”

The clip quickly went viral on social media, with Ronan praised for holding the men to account.

Mescal was asked on Irish broadcaster RTE’s The Late Late Show if they were surprised by the reaction the clip had.

“I’m not surprised that the message received as much attention that it got, because it’s massively important and I’m sure you’ve had Saoirse on the show, like, she’s… quite often, more often than not, the most intelligent person in the room,” he replied.

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He said she was “spot on” and “hit the nail on the head”, adding it was good “messages like that are kind of gaining traction – that’s a conversation that we should absolutely be having on a daily basis”.

Ronan previously called the reaction to her comments “wild”.

She told The Ryan Tubridy Show on Virgin Radio UK: “It’s definitely not something that I had expected, and I didn’t necessarily set out to sort of make a splash.”

But she said men and women from around the world had reached out to her following the moment.

She said the men on the show “weren’t sort of like debunking anything that I was saying”, and explained Mescal “completely gets” the issue as they have talked about it before.