Saoirse Ronan won family trip to Florida by impersonating Shrek character

Saoirse Ronan won a holiday to Florida as a child by impersonating the Gingerbread Man from Shrek 2.

The Mary Queen of Scots star decided to compete in a national radio contest in her native Ireland when she was nine - and she won the grand prize - a family vacation.

Recalling the big win during an appearance on The Graham Norton Show, Ronan said, "I had never entered into a competition like that before.

"It was the first day of the summer holidays... and Shrek 2 had just come out and (late radio host) Gerry Ryan was giving away this holiday to Florida and what you had to do (to win) was phone in as one of the characters... and tell Gerry why you deserved the holiday.

"We'd never been on a proper holiday. I got on... and I did it as the Gingerbread Man."

Saoirse thought she'd missed out on the main prize when she received a "blow-up donkey" from the radio bosses in the mail, but Ryan called her back a week later with some good news.

British talk show host Norton managed to get hold of audio footage of both Ronan's impersonation and her reaction to winning the vacation live on air, and played it during his show, which aired on Friday night (18Jan19).

During her chat with fellow Irish native Norton, Saoirse also opened up about filming the scary car-jumping scene in her 2017 movie Lady Bird.

The actress revealed there was no budget for a stunt double, so she had to exit the moving vehicle in the middle of a row with her film mother, played by Laurie Metcalf.

"It's a wonder I survived," she laughed. "It was a moving car and it was an the end of the film as well. They could have just left me there."