McMahon is marking two decades with the Irish soap.
Actor George McMahon plays Mondo in the saga and is hoping his twenty years with RTÉ’s four-nights a week serial will have a happy-on screen anniversary. He in particular says he’d like to see his character tie the knot with Melanie, played by Nyree Yergainharsian.
Speaking to RTÉ Entertainment he noted that he would love to mark the 20th anniversary of his debut as Mondo by seeing his character marrying partner Melanie next year. Since his arrival in the village of Carrigstown in 2002 the character has gone from teenage troublemaker to a father and now a much calmer partner to Melanie.
“I hope that there’ll be wedding bells between Mondo and Melanie. I love a good soap wedding anyway because there’s always other stuff that comes along with that, so that would be great. In terms of my favourite storylines over the years, my very first storyline is something that always sticks out for me – the teenage pregnancy.
“Someone actually only just sent me a photograph recently of me holding baby Juliet in my arms – but baby Juliet was actually a baby boy because they couldn’t find a baby small enough! It was a full year of high drama. Mondo was only 16 and it was my first [big story in the show] so that will always stick out as my favourite storyline… Maybe Mondo and Melanie getting married might be the big storyline!” – George McMahon
However, he also pondered that rarely in soap do things run happily for long, so maybe his 20th on-screen could be a series of heartaches… RTÉ viewers will have to wait and see.
Fair City aired its first-ever episode in September 1989 with one episode a week for a limited run. By 1999, the soap was entertaining viewers three times weekly. At its peak the programme in recent years has pulled in an average of nearly half a million viewers four times a week on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays at 8 pm on RTÉ One. Fair City was briefly screened in the UK to viewers in Scotland on the now-defunct STV2. The series will celebrate its 35th anniversary in 2024.
Fair City airs on RTÉ One in Ireland.
