When Rosie O’Donnell takes to the Gilded Balloon stage, it’s likely to be a highly charged affair. Her first live show in nearly a dozen years, Common Knowledge came about because the 63-year-old Emmy and Tony-winning actress/writer/comic/presenter recently moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old daughter Clay; an emotive, politically tinged decision. This multimedia show will be ‘more than just a comic with a mic,’ she promises, when we speak over Zoom, just two days after settling into her new home in a Dublin suburb. ‘It’s going to begin with my mother’s death in 1973 and go up to current day, moving at 63 with an autistic 12-year-old, getting over here and figuring it all out.’

Unsurprisingly, upping sticks has been ‘a big adjustment.’ O’Donnell may have a cosmopolitan career, from co-starring with Madonna in 1992’s baseball movie A League Of Their Own to hosting her own talk show to popping up in And Just Like That as well as Curb Your Enthusiasm, but having four older children with ex-wife Kelli Carpenter, she’s never been a great one for journeying outside of the States. ‘I like staying home,’ she admits. ‘I like being near where my kids are.’

An outspoken critic of Trump, O’Donnell felt the urge to finally move when he won his second term in office, leaving behind America. ‘I was never leaving it for good, but I was leaving it for as long as it takes to right the wrongs that are happening now. And having a non-binary, autistic, special-needs child gives you a whole other area to worry about. Who knows what it will turn out to be for their journey and their life?’

O’Donnell, who adopted Clay in 2013 with late ex-wife Michelle Rounds, is clearly fearful of what’s happening in America, especially regarding discrimination towards trans and non-binary people. ‘It’s like the country is going backwards. And I really didn’t feel safe and felt as though I needed to prioritise my mental health, so I thought that moving to Ireland would be the healthiest choice for me and my family.’

All of this gives her fuel for a new one-woman show, a production she hopes will ultimately play in London, New York and Ireland after this ten-day Fringe run (in what is her first-ever appearance here). You suspect one person who’ll be keeping an eye on reviews will be Trump, who has been engaged in a war of words with O’Donnell for two decades now, most recently claiming he was giving ‘serious consideration’ to taking away her US citizenship.

It all goes back to 2006, long before Trump’s political career, when O’Donnell exposed ‘that he had been bankrupt, that he wasn’t a successful businessman, that he had all these sex-abuse charges; I just told the truth about him and he went absolutely crazy. He has never forgotten it, and he’s never turned down an opportunity to defame and deride and diminish me, but I’m very proud to know that I am against every single thing that he is and he believes. It’s a bold position to be in at this time in the world, to be opposed to him.’

O’Donnell, whose mother was Irish-American and whose father came from County Donegal, has found locals ‘unbelievably welcoming’ since moving. ‘It’s a whole different world,’ she says. ‘Politically, people are much more unified here about what they think about what’s going on in America and what they think about what’s going on in Israel. And my political leanings are very much in line with this country more so than they are with my own right now.’

The fact she can go about her business, with just the occasional nod in a restaurant or pub, has also been a delight. ‘It reminds me of before I was famous, because Ireland doesn’t have the cultural obsession with fame that America has. They don’t hold people in hierarchies based on their notoriety.’ It’s also meant she’s been able to peacefully refine her stage show in 100-seater clubs in Ireland, before coming over to Edinburgh. And she’s raring to go. ‘There’s nothing like performing live,’ she smiles. Trump, watch out.

Rosie O’Donnell: Common Knowledge, Gilded Balloon Appleton Tower, 1–10 August, 8.45pm.