An Audience with May McFettridge

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A bronze bust of the buxom Belfast backstreet bombshell takes pride of place in the Grand Opera House.

Recently I read somewhere that it would be possible to live on oranges and Guinness for the rest of your life - but they don't say how long your life would be! For further information please visit our Knee Surgery page or contact 028 9066 7878 to speak to a member of our patient advisor team.May already has a fantastic 30-year following for her work and we are proud that she has chosen us as the launch-pad for what we are certain will be a remarkable step into the opera world! John Linehan was a car mechanic before he rose to fame in the guise of his plain-speaking, gap-toothed housewife character, May McFettridge. May McFettridge is delighted to announce that, after many, many offers from opera companies all over the world, she will make her operatic debut appearance for Northern Ireland Opera at the Grand Opera House, Belfast. It’s a great play, it’s a five-hander about the known and unknown by a woman who knows nothing in the first place.

I like to get the sun on my back, but the wife’s passport wasn’t up to date, so I was thinking of something to do. The rest of the year if you're working, you're doing weddings, TV shows, radio, personal appearances and you aren't flat out. You can therefore imagine my surprise and delight when I happened upon May (AKA John Linehan) McFettridge in my local pub in Kildare. In 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic the Grand Opera House announced that their annual pantomime would not take place and was rescheduled to the 2021/22 season. John Linehan, 71, is the person who knows her better than most and the story of how May became May is one of happenstance.Indeed, her highly acclaimed stage show, An Audience with May McFettridge, at Belfast’s Grand Opera House proved just that. I recognised him from the Jack and the Beanstalk pantomime in which he stole the show with his humour; timing and sense of fun. In the hands of her softly-spoken alter ego John Linehan, she has become something of a cultural icon - part of the Christmas furniture at the Opera House, where, in the 101 years of its life, she has given more performances than any other person, real or imagined, living or dead. Then because I have three bears in my Circus, she tries to steal them from me, and we have to get them back.

There are no bad apples in this cast, with young Dublin actress Aisling Sharkey having the crowd rooting for Snow White as the Queen tried to poison her.Paddy Jenkins, as Mr Potts, Georgia Lennon, as Belle, Ben Richards, who will play the role of the Beast and May McFettridge, as Mrs Potts Picture Matt Mackey / Press Eye. It’s a brilliant comedy of male paranoia, bringing out the absurdity of man’s egomania and obsessions with sexual potency, conquests and status. And from now until January 15, children and adults alike can expect laugh-out-loud comedy, stunning scenery and beautiful costumes as May stars as the Fairy Godmother in Cinderella – clocking up a record-breaking 32 Grand Opera House pantomime seasons.