Founders
Gerry Grennell
Co-Founder
Gerry Grennell is one of the film industry’s most sought-after voice, Alexander Technique, and performance coaches. Trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London, the Constructive Teaching Centre London (Alexander Technique), and the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hannover, he has spent more than three decades working with leading actors in film.
His collaborators include Johnny Depp, Meryl Streep, Natalie Portman, Tom Cruise, Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, and Oscar Isaac, with whom he has worked for more than a decade. Grennell also collaborated extensively with the late Heath Ledger across multiple projects, including The Dark Knight and Brokeback Mountain.
In 2014 he helped establish Bow Street Academy, Ireland’s National Screen Acting School, where his approach to screen performance helped shape the Academy’s training philosophy. He is also a co-founder of Bow Street Academy Los Angeles.
Shimmy Marcus
Co-Founder & Artistic Director
Shimmy Marcus is an award-winning filmmaker and Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Bow Street Academy, Ireland’s National Screen Acting School. His films include Soulboy, starring Felicity Jones, and Headrush, starring Steven Berkoff, for which he won the Miramax Scriptwriting Award. In 2010 he became a founding member of the Screen Directors Guild of Ireland.
Marcus joined The Factory filmmakers’ collective in 2011 and began coaching actors full time in 2012. In 2014 The Factory evolved into Bow Street Academy which he still runs today. While there he has created the Bow Street Meets interview series featuring actors including Oscar Isaac, Andrew Garfield, and Saoirse Ronan, and the Actor as Creator short film scheme in partnership with Screen Ireland. He is also a co-founder of Bow Street Academy Los Angeles, where he serves as Artistic Director.
