No Air Head

The location is the new Firestation nightspot on Tara St in Dublin, the occasion is the launch of Motorola s new V2288 mobile phone and the guest of honour is MTV s Select s vivacious vixen Donna Air.

Ms Air speaks for all of a minute and a half before settling down with a pineapple juice for our chat. She s even prettier in the flesh than she is on telly, if unusually thin, and actually looks a lot younger than her twenty years. Donna originally graced our screens on the BBC teen-soap Byker Grove, in the company of such luminaries as Ant and Dec, before joining girl band Crush for a brief and not entirely successful career in music.
I couldn t sing a bloody note, she admits, in a Newcastle accent that s slightly softer than her television persona. It s a case of finding out what you re good at, and singing really isn t my thing.
So, is presenting a difficult job?
Look, I could lie, and I probably should, but actually, (whispers), it s a piece of piss, it s sooo easy. I m lucky in that the Select team are fantastic, great fun and excellent with supplying good callers, but yeah, it s easy. Since March I ve been working on The Big Breakfast for Channel 4, and also I ve got a late night pop-gossip show called Pop Gun, so I m quite busy. Also I m acting again, cos that s still my first love, in a period drama called Dinner Of Herbs for the BBC, and I get to wear loads of cool 1840 s clothes.
Ahh, clothes. Many of us are more familiar with the unclothed Ms Air, as she regularly appears bra and pantie clad for photoshoots in glossy lad-mags like Loaded. Is she aware of the fact that men may actually read these magazines, em, one-handed so to speak.
Aaargh, I can t believe you asked me that!, she says, looking appalled. I don t do as many of those shoots as people think, cos they re-use the pictures for calendars and stuff. Basically I don t do anything I don t enjoy, and if I ve got something I want to publicise and I can do that while wearing nice gear, or, uh, not wearing a lot of nice gear, I ll do it. It s not up to me what happens afterwards. Do you know, if you re right, I d be quite flattered, but seriously I don t think about it.
Is it true that Donna once asked The Corrs, live on air, how they got together?
Irish journalists always ask me this. I dunno... I haven t interviewed the Corrs for four years, and I certainly don t remember asking that. I didn t, and if I did I m sure I was taking the piss...
Does she have a boyfriend?
Nah, I don t, she sighs. I m really busy with work so I don t go out much...
But I thought she was big mates with the Meg Matthews mafia?
Not really, cos everyone s so busy. I used to see Meg a lot cos she used to live really close to me, but not so much now. Nowadays I just sleep to relax. Occasionally I ll go out with mates, I ve got one old friend and one new friend so I ll go out drinking with them. I m a big Tequila fan. When we were in Dublin for the MTV Awards we all got rat-arsed in a ballad pub in Temple Bar. My limit s about nine.
Does she take drugs?
It depends what you d call a drug, coffee s a drug, alcohol is a drug, but if you mean what I think you mean then no.
Who s the most fanciable person she s ever interviewed?
George Clooney, but I m useless at flirting. I always play it too cool. That s why I m still single I suppose.