Fiona O'Loughlin | |
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![]() Live at The Little Dum Dum Club podcast recording 12 November 2016. | |
Birth name | Fiona Taheny |
Born | Warooka, South Australia, Australia | 16 July 1963
Medium | Stand-up comedy, television |
Nationality | Australian |
Years active | 2000–present |
Subject(s) | Family, marriage, storytelling |
Spouse | Chris O'Loughlin (m. 1985–2012) |
Children | Five |
Relative(s) | Emily Taheny (sister) |
Fiona Taheny (born 16 July 1963), commonly known as Fiona O'Loughlin, is an Australian comedian. O'Loughlin has made television performances on ABC TV's Spicks and Specks , and Network Ten's Rove Live , Good News Week , All Star Family Feud , The Project , Studio 10 , Show Me the Movie! and Hughesy, We Have a Problem and a series of advertisements for Heinz soups. [1] She has performed as a headline act in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and the Edinburgh Fringe festival. In 2011 a book of her short stories, Me of the Never Never: The (Chaotic) Life and Times of Fiona O'Loughlin was published by Hachette Australia. [2]
In the early 1990s O'Loughlin was writing a column for the Centralian Advocate , and emceeing cabaret shows at the Araluen Arts Centre. By 1994 she was doing a weekly radio segment on the ABC. In 2000 she appeared at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. [3]
In 2001, she won the award for Best Newcomer at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival with her show, Fiona and her sister (and some weird guy). [4]
In 2007, she was the "funny woman" in the Seven Network's Sunrise . [5]
In 2009, she was a contestant on the Australian version of Dancing with the Stars . [6]
In 2012, O'Loughlin was a candidate on the second series of The Celebrity Apprentice Australia ; she was the first to be fired from the series.
In 2014, she appeared on the ABC TV’s Australian Story discussing her career and her alcoholism. [7]
In 2018, she was a contestant on fourth season of the Australian version of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! . She won the series and donated the prize of $100,000 to her chosen charity, Angel Flight. [8] In 2018, she appeared as herself in the comedy film That's Not My Dog! She appeared as a guest quiz master on Have You Been Paying Attention?
In 2021, O'Loughlin appeared as a guest on episode #23 of Riley Dyson’s Aussies with Stories! podcast. O'Loughlin appeared as leader of the negative team on Australia Debates.
Fiona Taheny was born into an Irish-Australian family at Warooka, South Australia, and is herself a single mother of five children. She lived in Alice Springs for 27 years but relocated to Melbourne in 2012. She was married to Chris O'Loughlin from 1985-2012. Her family, and attitude towards children, make up a large component of her act. [9]
In 2009, O'Loughlin collapsed during a performance in Brisbane. She subsequently announced that she suffers from alcoholism. [10]
Her younger sister, Emily Taheny, is also a comedian and formerly a regular cast member of Comedy Inc. O'Loughlin's daughter, Biddy O'Loughlin, is a comedian, and toured Ireland in 2011–12. [11]