Biography

Bren is the daughter of Belfast born natives, Prof. Michael B. McElroy, an Atmospheric Physicist at Harvard University and Angela Veronica McElroy a retired math teacher and artist. She grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts attending Milton Academy grades 1-12 where she discovered acting and became the National Champion in Dramatic Interpretation and was a National Endowment for the Arts recipient in Theater.

McElroy left Cambridge to attend Kenyon College, receiving her BA in Drama as well as the Joanne Woodward Acting Award for for best actress. She spent her junior year abroad studying theater in London at the British American Drama Academy under the tutelage of Fiona Shaw, Simon Callow & Diana Quick. She furthered her studies at the prestigious American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco where she received her MFA in Acting. Bren was invited into the Conservatory's professional company where she earned her Actor's Equity card. She then moved to NYC, signing with a bi-coastal talent agency. She had a small role in on 'All My Children' but it was Paramount's 'Dead Man on Campus' that brought her back to California where she lived for nearly ten years in Los Angeles as an actor.

With dual citizenship she moved to Dublin, Ireland Dublin where she is best known as Cassandra in the Irish National TV series Fair City. Bren has performed in theaters across the United States, Ireland and the U.K. Productions include Lynn Nottage's world premiere of Las Meninas (San Jose Repertory Theatre), the premiere of The Robb'd That Smiled (Dublin Fringe Festival/Old Museum Arts Theater, Belfast), The Comedy of Errors (Tricycle Theatre in London), Othello (American Conservatory Theater,) and most recently The Thin Place at The Gloucester Stage Company. Bren was a morning news reporter for KPFK in Los Angeles and has performed in numerous voice-over commercials. She has narrated several novels on Audible and is a long time member of AEA & SAG-AFTRA. She coaches at her school Communication Matters Studio in Cambridge, MA while auditioning and working as a professional actor in NYC and Boston.
- IMDb mini biography by: William K. McCauley