About Cara
Cara Winter has been a writer, performer, and theater educator for over 30 years.
She was a Trustee Scholar at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where she performed with The New York Oratorio Society in Handel's Messiah prior even to performing at her own university. She appeared in several productions at NYU, including the TSOA mainstage production of Uncle Vanya by Anton Checkov, and Classical Studio productions of Henry IV, Pt 1, Henry IV Pt 2 (as “Falstaff”) and in All's Well That Ends Well. In 1997, Cara graduated from NYU with a BFA in Acting.
Post-grad, Cara dove into the local theater scene on the Lower East Side of New York City, directing, acting and devising theater with The Hyperbolic Players. The experimental troupe rehearsed out of the community-run CHARAS / El Bohio space, where actor Luiz Guzman got his start. Known for creating outlandish and ambitious works, The Hyperbolic Players played in storefront theaters around Manhattan’s Lower East Side, moving just one time to Off- Broadway with the New York Premiere of The Illusion by Tony Kushner.
Over the next decade and a half, Cara would work in the commercial theater as an actress, director, playwright, and stage manager, performing in regional and stock theaters, and touring the country with various road productions. Cara has over 50 professional theater credits to her name, and has graced such iconic stages as Carnegie Hall, Town Hall in NYC, and the Fox Theater in St. Louis. She also made brief appearances in the pilot episode of NBC's Law & Order: Trial By Jury, the film 16 Blocks with Bruce Willis, and The Producers with Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane.
In late 2007, Cara’s original play, Social Work, was produced by Tony Award®-winning producers Anna & Alan Ostroff, and her energies began to be funneled into writing. In 2008, she moved her young family to Chicago, where she quickly became part of the storefront theater scene. She directed Play On! for Gorilla Tango Theatre, and created a one-woman show, The Broad Strikes Back, which she performed at Davenport’s Cabaret. Cara also taught theater and playwriting for Arts For All, Pegasus Theater and the Puerto-Rican Arts Alliance.
In 2013, Cara began learning the craft of screenwriting. Her first spec script, Brothers in Arms (for the TV show The Newsroom) won 1st Prize in the TVWriter’s Spec Scriptacular competition, and was a Second Rounder at the Austin Film Festival. Her first original TV show pilot, Evolution, garnered similar praise, and has since been adapted into a book series. Her follow-up, Twirl, a TV dramedy about an unraveling American farming family, garnered several awards, and was subsequently pitched to Lionsgate, 21 Laps, Hello Sunshine, Lucky Chap, among others. Cara’s screenwriting mentors have included literary manager Adreana Robbins, actress-turned-director Melanie Mayron, and Larry Brody, who encouraged her to "...figure out how to make your own stuff!"
Cara is a founding member of Cottage Grove Productions, a Chicago-based production company. With CGP, Cara has grown into an accomplished creative producer. Her film Bosom is currently streaming on KweliTV, and the Emmy® Award nominated Cottage Grove streamed on AMC+. She currently is producing three more short films,and has three feature film scripts in development with her long-time collaborator, George Ellzey, Jr.
In 2025, Cara founded The Orson Welles Initiative, an Illinois nonprofit formed to support mid-career, contemporary American artists. She still resides in Chicago with her son. For Film & TV, Cara is represented by Lee Goldberg in New York. [imdb / linkedin]