Based on the potato famine in Ireland in the 1840's, the play takes a family crisis and turns it into a microscopic segment of those turbulent times. The facts of the hunger are well known. A million died and a million left for the New World over a four-year period. All this against a background of food being produced and exported to England and beyond with landlords taking the opportunity to rid the land of troublesome peasants. 

Old Red Lion, 418 St John Street, Islington EC1 4NJ 5th to 23rd May

This production is dedicated to the memory of Lorcan Devine (Old Red Lion)

What the press have said about Famine

"A Victorian interlude with more than a pinch of Sean O'Casey's caustic wit. It comes off very well." The Stage

"There is acerbic humour aplenty among the tragedy and the actors do an excellent job of delivering the dry wit of the characters." Camden Gazette

“Famine play is as powerful and relevant as ever” Irish Post ****

“Mr. Dunne deserves great praise for his historically accurate, yet accessible and colourful dialogue.” Extra Extra


The desperate need to quench hunger in spite of one’s dignity or faith is wonderfully encapsulated by the Mother/Daughter relationship of Kathleen (Lisa Sheerin) and Teresa (Gillian Horgan). Nowhere does Dunne’s script more satisfyingly capture the dry, razor sharp Irish rhetoric than the Mother lampooning her daughter’s preference for the Church over men, with the line “She’s too concerned with bedding down with Jesus Christ himself!”

Mr. Dunne deserves great praise for his historically accurate, yet accessible and colourful dialogue. In addition, very natural performances from Jeremiah O’Connor and Marilyn O’Brien, with their poetic, native accents, are highly moving in depicting the wretched hopelessness of the period. Extra Extra


London Irish Theatre gratefully acknowledge the enormous help and support it gets from the London Irish Centre, Camden Square without which this and other London Irish shows would not be possible.

An extensively performed one-act version [Gorta] was performed by the Elephant Theatre in 1982. a full-length version received its premier by the same company in 1985. The play is based on The Great Hunger by Cecil Woodham-Smith (Hamish Hamilton 1962)