Celebrating 26 years playing Orla Molloy on Fair City, fan favourite Sorcha Furlong sits down with Janice Butler to discuss her enduring love of acting, the joys of motherhood and the support that helps her through difficult times.
Actress Sorcha Furlong has played fan favourite Orla Molloy in Fair City for 26 years. In that time, she has lived life as fully off-screen as on.
Dodging heavy rain showers on our shoot in Barberstown Castle, a stone’s throw from her home in West Dublin, she’s in good form, having just finished a run of the stage production Happiness Then in Dublin.
“I’ve been double jobbing,” she says. “I was feeling my age with it,” she laughs. Even though she’s spent her life on screen, she admits to being slightly uncomfortable posing in front of the camera. “I don’t like all the focus on me,” she remarks.
Sorcha was 23 when she started working on Fair City, for what was meant to be only a few weeks. In what turned out to be a significantly longer gig, her character, Orla, has married Wayne Molloy and Paul Brennan, cheated on him with Lenny, and experienced a severe health crisis with her son Junior. Orla often finds herself engaged in petty Carrigstown gossip and deception; it’s been quite the ride.
“It seems absolutely mad. I thought I was only coming in for a couple of weeks, but you don’t feel the time pass. I think that’s a good sign when you’re working on something you love. Every year, I’m thankful that I get a contract; I never take that for granted,” she comments.
Sorcha’s character has been involved in some big storylines over the years, and as a mother herself to a teenage daughter (Stella, 16), she says the storyline in which her on-screen son Junior was seriously ill really hit home. “The Junior story affected me deeply as a mam. It’s extremely important to me that we try to reflect as accurately as possible what families in this situation are going through,” she says.
While it’s nice to be the topic of watercooler moments, she remarks that she’s content when her character Orla is in the background. “It’s great getting a chunk of the pie and getting a storyline you can research and get stuck into. But it’s also nice when you’re in the background of other people’s stories because you might not see certain actors for a couple of weeks or a couple of months, so it’s nice to be involved with whatever they have going on. We all get a piece of the pie, and that’s the way it goes,” she says.
Growing up in Lucan, Co Dublin, Sorcha always wanted to be an actor. Her grand uncle was Joe Lynch, who famously played Dinny Byrne in Glenroe, but Sorcha remarks that her family weren’t involved in the showbiz world.
Her father, Dave, is in the “rag trade”, and her mother Patricia works in retail. “They’re not anyway enamoured by the business. It certainly wasn’t something that was pushed on me; if anything, my parents were encouraging me to get a ‘proper’ job, but they did support me when I wanted to be an actor,” she recalls.
She went to the Gaiety School of Acting as a teenager and then on to study theatre in college. “It was something that I always wanted to do and not for the adoration or the fame but for the love of it.”
She’s been able to combine screen work with Fair City and her love of theatre over the years. “They’re both completely different experiences. Theatre is an adrenaline rush. You are connecting with the audience, and you want to hold that connection with them and bring them on that journey. I love the stage, and I think it makes me a better screen actor, because it grounds you,” she says.
Music is a big passion of hers, too, and she has been gigging since she was 19. However, over the years and especially since becoming a parent, she says she had to prioritise the sort of work she takes. “You take the work that you love, and I’m lucky I’m in a position that I love what I do,” she says. “I need to be around for the chaos that is life,” she laughs.
When she’s not on Fair City, she works in the family business, a menswear label called House of U, where she works with her dad and cousin. “I got into the family business,” she says. “It’s lovely to get that time with my dad and cousin; it works well,” she adds.
At home, it’s Sorcha and her daughter Stella, who she says is her “world”. “I always knew I wanted kids. I was 33 when I had Stella, and I just can’t imagine not having her. She’s the best thing that’s happened to me, but don’t tell her I said that!” she laughs.
“It’s hard when you’re parenting a teenager because you do have to let them go a little bit, but then you want to protect them too. I think because it’s just the two of us; she’s my life, and I probably need to loosen the rein. But it’s a different dynamic when there’s just two of you,” she adds.
Sorcha credits her family, her parents and sister Louisa, who live close by, for their help with childcare over the years. “I’d be lost without them,” she says sincerely.
She’s had a difficult few years personally – her marriage to Fair City writer Ken Harmon, who she married in 2019, ended during Covid. He passed away suddenly in 2024. While they were no longer together, the loss is hugely felt by her and the team at Fair City. She’s emotional when talking about it, and unsurprisingly, she doesn’t want to say too much.
“My family and friends get me through as well as memories and my daughter. It’s sad, of course it’s sad, it’s absolutely devastating. He was a big part of my life and a lot of people’s lives, so it’s absolutely hard. But that’s all I really want to say about it; it’s very raw.”
She adds that the Fair City family are hugely supportive of each other, and they have gone through so many life experiences together, both good and bad. “We’ve all gone through personal stuff in our time on the show. We’ve lost colleagues, people have had babies, people have been sick. When you work 12 hours a day with a group of people, it is like a family. People are there for you no matter what, in good times and in bad times,” she says.
Sorcha turns 50 next year, and when the styling team on the shoot were packing up, the conversation turned to Botox. Sorcha announced she had recently got it done for the first time, and later I ask if she minds putting that on the record. “Of course not,” she says. I ask her why now?
“A lot of my friends have had it done, so I just thought I’d try it. They were all laughing at me, ringing up asking them questions, and calling me a Botox virgin,” she laughs. “I’m on a bit of a skin journey, but I’m not looking to do anything drastic. I got the minimum amount because I’m an actor; I need to be able to move my face.
“It wasn’t really for vanity, just more to see what it would do. I certainly don’t want to look like I’m frozen. I’d like to grow old gracefully-ish. I have stretch marks and life marks, and I am proud of them,” she adds.
Ageing doesn’t bother her, she says, and she’s happy in her skin and where she’s at in life. “I don’t think about it until I say to myself I’m going to be 50, how did that happen?” she laughs. “But work is going great, Stella is great, so I focus on those things; age is just a number.”
She’s also found huge joy in the new member of the family, a cockapoo puppy called Stevie (after Stevie Nicks) that they got last year. “He’s absolutely gorgeous, and he’s great company for me. He’s filled a little hole I didn’t know was there,” she gushes. “He’s been great for me; I didn’t expect to love him so much.”
As for the world of Orla in Fair City, things are crazy as ever for her, juggling a busy life, a little like Sorcha herself. “She’s managing Vino’s, she’s going for the interview for the job in the prison, she’s doing Tiny Tours, and be a mum”, she says. “So she’s a lot going on, but that makes it interesting.”