The Riordans

The Riordans was the second Irish soap opera made by Radio Telifís Éireann (then called Telifís Éireann). It ran from 1965 to 1979 and was set in the fictional townland of Leestown in County Kilkenny. Its use of Outside Broadcast Units and its filming of its episodes on location rather than in studio, broke the mould of broadcasting in the soap opera genre, and inspired the creation of its British equivalent, Emmerdale Farm (now called Emmerdale) by Yorkshire Television in 1972.

Later careers of the actors

Some of the actors had distinguished careers after the axing of The Riordans.

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• After Bracken Gabriel Byrne went to the United States where be became a successful film actor.
• Tony Doyle, Father Sheehy, who had left the series in the mid-1970s, became a successful television actor with the BBC, starring in among other shows Ballykissangel, before dying suddenly aged 58 on the brink of his biggest television role yet.
• John Cowley worked largely in films, playing the "auctioneer" in John B. Keane's The Field with Richard Harris and also on stage. Cowley also continued with his lifelong campaign against coursing and other blood sports. He died in 1998.
• Annie Dalton, Minnie Brennan, who was Cowley's much older wife in real life, died in 1983.
• Chris O'Neill, Michael Riordan, worked for some years as agent for Gabriel Byrne. He died in the United States in 1991.
• Biddy White Lennon, Maggie Riordan, left acting and has become a successful author and publisher of cookery books.
• Tom Hickey is now an acclaimed stage and film actor and fronts a successful series of risque television adverts for a soft drink, Club Orange.
• Moira Deady went on to act in Glenroe, the spin-off show that came from Bracken, the spin-off from The Riordans. She also starred in a number of films, including Angela's Ashes.