James O’Brien says he left his stag for his wife’s hen because he was ‘uncomfortable’
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James O’Brien has revealed he abandoned his stag do 25 years ago because he was “uncomfortable” – so he decided to gatecrash his wife’s hen instead.
Speaking in a segment about British stag do culture on his LBC show on Wednesday (16 October), the radio host recalled feeling “uncomfortable” in the Soho establishment where his friends took him to celebrate his wedding.
“Do you know what a soppy git I was when I was getting married to Mrs O’Brien?” the radio host began.
O’Brien said his friends took him out in London’s Soho to “the kind of place you don’t know about unless you spend a lot of time in Soho”.
“This is going back 24 years,” he reminded listeners, pointing towards how much Soho – the centre of London’s sex work industry –has changed in the past few decades.
O’Brien said he was “very uncomfortable” in an establishment that he described as “louche and amoral”.
“I was on the phone with my now wife and ended up meeting her around the corner where she was out with her mates in the same part of town,” he said.
He then recalled tales from another stag do he went on in Barcelona and ended up in a place he wouldn’t have visited “in any other circumstances”.
After making the comments live on air, one listener said on X/Twitter that it was “weird” that he turned up at his wife’s hen.
One person savagely wrote: “I’m sure the ladies were delighted to see him. Not.”
Another added: “Not wanting to watch strippers is fine, and it would actually be quite admirable to say ‘Sorry lads, not my scene. I’m off home.’ You don’t have to crash a hen party though, that’s a bit weird.”
O’Brien was making the comments after night councillors in Prague banned pub crawls as they aim to attract “more cultured” tourists to the Czech capital.
They cited “unreasonable alcohol consumption” and “disruptive behaviour” associated with pub crawls.
Concentrated around the bars and nightclubs near Wenceslas Square, Prague’s pub and bar crawls are particularly popular with British tourists celebrating stag and hen dos.
“I read today that Prague has had enough of British stag do antics,” said O’Brien during his radio show. “Amsterdam, Munich and Budapest have all banned beer bikes, which we have in London.”
In May, Prague councillors proposed that outrageous costumes worn by stag and hen party groups should be banned to tackle overtourism.
The suggested “silly costume” ban is intended to address noise pollution and unruly tourist behaviour in the nightlife scene.
