Frank Grimes was born in Dublin and trained at the Abbey Theatre School of Acting. He was a member of the Abbey Players for seven years and performed in O’Casey, Synge, Yeats, Lady Gregory, Joyce and O’Connor. He scored an early success as the young Brendan Behan in Borstal Boy, which he played over a thousand times in Dublin, Belfast, Limerick and Paris. In New York, at Broadway’s Lyceum Theatre, it won the Tony award in the 1969-1970 season, and Frank Grimes received a Tony nomination for Best Actor. He won the Outer Critics’ Circle Award and Variety voted him the Most Promising Young Actor of the Year in the New York critics’ poll.
Theatre:
UK: Bryan David in Veterans (Royal Court); Arthur in The Farm (Royal Court/Mayfair Theatre); Sammy in Life Class (Royal Court/Duke of York’s); Erhart in John Gabriel Borkman (National Theatre); Konstantin in The Seagull, Aubrey in The Bed Before Yesterday (Lyric Theatre); Jerry Divine in Juno and the Paycock (RSC at The Aldwych); Lovberg in Hedda (Roundhouse); Trofimov in The Cherry Orchard (Haymarket Theatre); Ned in Holiday (Old Vic); Colin in The March on Russia (RNT); title role in Hamlet (Theatre Royal, Stratford East); Christy in The Playboy of the Western World (Riverside Studios); Mark Anthony in Julius Caesar (Young Vic); Husz in A Bright Room Called Day (Bush Theatre); Stephen in The Fishing Trip (Croydon Warehouse) (which he also wrote); Da in Da (Riverside Studios); Martin Dysart in Equus, Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, Roche in Afore Night Come (Theatr Clwyd). Hugh O’Donnell in Translations (Manchester Library Theatre) Frank was Father O’Donnell in the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Ben Elton musical THE BEAUTIFUL GAME at The Cambridge Theatre. All That Fall (Jermyn St. and Arts Theatre. Maurice in THE NIGHT ALIVE Gaiety, Dublin and Lyric, Belfast.
He has performed his one-man show “The he and the she of It…” A Portrait of James Joyce, at the Wimbledon Theatre Studio, at the Dublin Theatre Fringe Festival and The Ustinov Studio, Bath and Jermyn St. Theatre.
Broadway: Borstal Boy, Lyceum Theatre.
Off Broadway: Mick in The Holly and the Ivy (Roundabout Theatre); Steven in In Celebration (Manhattan Theatre Club); Charles in Blithe Spirit (The Whole Theatre, New Jersey); Christy in The Playboy of the Western World (Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival); Hamlet in Hamlet Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington DC. All That Fall, E59 Theatre.
Television:
Barry in Coronation Street, (Granada) Building The Titanic (Granada) Holby City (BBC) The Vice, The Bill (3 times) (Carlton) Dark Realm (WB) Plastic Man, Kavanagh QC (Carlton) Silent Witness (BBC) The Wingless Bird (Festival Films) five episodes of Casualty (BBC) Dying of the Light (YTV) Comics (Cinema Verity) Sherlock Holmes (Granada) Lady Chatterley’s Lover (BBC) You Me and Marley (BBC) Blind Justice (BBC) Strumpet City (RTE) The Old Crowd (LWT) My Son My Son, The Shadow of a Gunman, The Illumination of Mr Shannon (BBC) And No One Could Save Her (ABC). Fair City (RTE)
Film:
Paul in When the Sky Falls, Dr Wilhelm Reich in Reich, Priest in The War of the Buttons, Dubrolsky in The Dive, The Captain in Legend of Crystalstone, Mr Beckwith in The Whales of August, Paul in Couples and Robbers, Robert Tressell in Give Us This Day, Sammy in Britannia Hospital, Tony in The Outsider, Major Fuller in A Bridge Too Far, Pierre in The Tulips of Haarlem.
Awards:
Daily Post award for Best Actor ‘98 for Equus and A Christmas Carol. Barclays Theatre Nomination for Afore Night Come. Clarence Derwent Award for Holiday. Plays & Players Best Supporting Actor Award for The Farm. Silver Nymph Best Actor Award for Blind Justice. Jacob’s Television Award for Best Actor for Strumpet City.