Father Ted star Jon Kenny dead at 66: Actor and comedian revealed last year that his cancer had come back
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Father Ted star Jon Kenny who has died at the age of 66, originally suffered from non-Hodgkins lymphoma in his forties, but had recovered. However in 2020, he revealed that his cancer had returned and he was undergoing treatment. Jon Kenny is best known as one half of the famous Irish comic duo d'Unbelievables with Pat Shortt
Earlier this year, Jon Kenny revealed on the Oliver Callan show on RTÉ that "I was diagnosed… the cancer came back. I had it there again. I had it about three years ago, four years ago so I had some operation to remove some of my left lung and that was good. Good luck to that.
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Hide Ad"But didn't the f****r come back again on my left lung again (last year). I've been lucky now because my chemo is working so I've been grand. But just in the middle of it all then, just for the craic of it, you know when you're getting on with things and after I had my second chemo, didn't I get told I had heart failure. Just to throw that in the mix like… a nice little cocktail of things to be getting on with."


According to The Mirror, “This evening, Jon was scheduled to perform at The Schoolyard Theatre in Charleville, but earlier this week the venue announced the event had been cancelled.”
Although he suffered both heart failure and cancer, Jon Kenny remained positive and said: “I've been very lucky. I'm sure some people would say I've had bad luck, but I think when you come out the other end of anything, I think I've had a lot of good luck as well, everything has worked for me.
"I had a double bypass which kind of brilliantly mended me, fixed me up and got me back on the road and then, my cancer came back again about three years ago. I was diagnosed with lung cancer and they removed the lower part of my left lung. That kept me going again for another while, but it came back again now last year, so, I'm just on treatment for that at the moment.
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Hide Ad"But it's good that the treatment is working. It's all going well, I'm very lucky. Some shows I'm doing is just to see how my body is going to hold up doing some live performances.”
Jon Kenny is survived by wife Margie, daughter Leah and son Aaron.
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