She has played at the Edinburgh Festival every year since including 2001 where she not only performed her own solo show, Deirdre O'Kane is Crystallized, but also the two-hander Tis Pity She's Anonymous.
She has also played The Melbourne, Adelaide and Kilkenny Cat Laughs Festivals and has toured the Middle East, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Prague, Brussels and London.
In 2001, O'Kane (described in The Sunday Times as "absolutely superb")[10] played the leading role of Helen in Paths to Freedom, a six-part spoof-documentary for RTÉ/BBC Choice and starred in the RTÉ comedy series Fergus's Wedding.
In 2016, she made a guest appearance on the British TV show As Yet Untitled and told an anecdote about her car being double clamped by over-efficient clampers to whom she was rude over the phone.
The five-part series features Bill Bailey, Ardal O’Hanlon, Joanne McNally, Jason Byrne, Reginald D. Hunter, Neil Delamere, Emma Doran, Des Bishop, Catherine Bohart and Martin Angolo.