'We want to create something that balances out the tough parts of life'... Meath sisters launch new mini series

MEATH SISTERS Rebecca and Fiona Ryan have gone from growing up together, to acting in award winning series together, to becoming social media stars, to becoming mothers together.

Now, they are taking on their latest venture, 'Motherhustle', an online comedy mini-series that follows the ups and downs of womanhood, motherhood and sisterhood.

The Ryan sisters grew up just outside of Dunboyne, with their parents, John and Imelda Ryan, and their sister, Meljoann Ryan. The two sisters have just over a year between them in age, and both knew they wanted to go into acting from when they were just little girls, with performing arts running in their family.

The entire family were involved in the arts in some way, from casual hobbies to the third Ryan sister, Meljoann, pursuing her career as a successful singer and songwriter.

The Ryan sisters said: “Growing up, mam and dad were always supporting us in pursuing our dreams; bringing us to auditions, going over lines and researching directors.”

“Dad is the sweetest gentleman and one of our biggest influences. He’s the funniest person we know, and even when life threw hardships, he’d be there to crack a joke and lighten the mood."

The two sisters began their performing journey while attending The Young Gaiety Acting Course in The Gaiety School of Acting in Dublin every weekend. When they were fifteen and sixteen, they featured in the music video for Sinead O’Connor’s track “No Man’s Woman”.

After secondary school, the two sisters applied to do a full time course in The Gaiety School of Acting and Rebecca, the older of the two sisters, waited back a year for Fiona to finish her Leaving Cert so they could attend the school together. Fiona ended up being one of the youngest ever students to be accepted into the course.

Both Fiona and Rebecca never missed a day of acting school, and were both signed by an agent when they graduated.

Fiona said “we would wake up at half five in the morning to get the train to Dublin from Meath, and Rebecca would have all of her homework done, and I’d try and steal it on the train. Nothing has changed.”

After the two sisters finished their course in Dublin, Fiona immediately moved to London when she received her agent and Rebecca stayed back in Ireland, which was difficult for them to be apart for the first time, with the two sisters saying that it was “like a break up”.

“When I first moved to London, I was nineteen. I enjoyed the crazy whirlwind of living in this new place, but quickly after graduating, Rebecca and I were cast as twins in Showtime's series 'The Tudors', which was being filmed in Ireland.

I immediately flew back to Ireland from London and we ended up being in five episodes of the series.

To be on set watching all of the actors as a young actress was an invaluable experience and such a huge learning curve for the both of us. It was also so special to play on screen sisters with your real life sister.

We felt curious about everything on set and it’s where my love of production also stemmed from.”

From then on, the sisters were back to back with different projects. Fiona stayed in London for ten years until she was twenty-nine and went on to act in series such as 'The Bill', 'Endeavor' and she began working in independent films. She also started investing time in her production career, producing and directing a music video for her sister Rebecca and even a short film in Melbourne.

Rebecca moved to Vancouver and signed with an agent in Canada and went on to work as a television researcher for Virgin TV. She was pursuing music while acting took a back seat and said that she “always needed some sort of creative outlet”, whether that be acting, content creation or music.

Seven years ago, Fiona fell pregnant with her first child and decided to take a career break to travel around Australia with her husband, Jon, so they did up a van and off they went.

Rebecca met her husband, Bruce, in Canada and has since had two children, now aged six and two, with Fiona going on to have another child, who is now four.

From acting together, to becoming mother's together, Fiona and Rebecca decided to focus on their families and let their careers take a back seat for a while.

Since settling down and starting their families, the two sisters have moved home to Ireland.

During COVID times, Rebecca started to make relatable videos on TikTok, mainly about motherhood, to deal with the uncertainty of what was happening in the world and to add some laughter to rather strange times.

Her videos took off online, and now Rebecca has garnered over half a million loyal followers on TikTok alone.

Rebecca said: “I think the videos resonate with other mothers, because behind closed doors there can be really tough moments. It’s really good to talk to each other and realise we’re not going crazy or losing our minds. It's a safe space for mams, while using comedy to cope. Not every perfect thing you see on social media is real, and I want to bring awareness to that."

Now, Rebecca has a whopping one billion views between Instagram and TikTok on her videos.

Between Fiona’s experience in producing and directing, and Rebecca’s social media presence and following, the two sisters came together to create ‘Motherhustle’, their new online mini-series.

“We knew we had to come together and create something now we’re back in Ireland and the kids are a bit older, and we no longer have baby sick in our hair.”

The series consists of eight one minute long episodes that will be aired on Instagram and YouTube Shorts every Sunday at 8pm from Sunday 7th September. The series follows the lives of two sisters and how they navigate the trials and tribulations of motherhood and sisterhood together.

Fiona said “we decided to combine our love of acting and television with Rebecca’s content creation, as more and more people are tuning to social media as another source of entertainment.

You can do everything from your phone now. We directed, shot and edited the show completely on Rebecca’s phone. We use comedy to get through things and want people to come online and see something that balances out the tough parts of life, especially while there is so much negativity in the world.”

From starting their careers in acting together to navigating motherhood together, Rebecca and Fiona Ryan have combined the two to create something wonderful, relatable and entertaining for their viewers.

A few local areas in Meath will pop up throughout the episodes, so make sure to keep an eye out.

Episode one of Motherhustle is out now and can be watched on Instagram here and on YouTube here.