Carolyn is...

Carolyn McDonald is an award-winning film producer, multidisciplinary artist, writer and filmmaker. She produced and directed the short film “P.N.O.K.”, the documentary DESIGN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD, several music videos & other short films. She has written screenplays for a variety of production companies (20th Century Fox, GMC) as well as original works, including the romantic dramedy script EVERGLOW, and book of poetry “Light Needs Night”, ’by’ its lead character.  

In addition to being the photographer of “Nouns in the Road”, TIME + TIDE: AS REVEALED BY LIGHT, and “Imaginary Bands & Their Fake Ass Songs”, Carolyn is the NAACP Image Award-winning producer of HBO’s AMERICA’S DREAM, the Emmy-nominated producer of TNT’s FREEDOM SONG and BUFFALO SOLDIERS, and the NatGeo documentary, BEARING LIGHT. After beginning her successful film industry career at Warner Bros. TV in advertising & publicity (working on campaigns for Blade Runner, the Superman franchise & WB cartoons), she was a creative executive at Cinecom, before she ran Danny Glover’s Carrie Productions for a decade.

Carolyn has exhibited her photographs at the Gantt Center for African-American Art + Culture in Charlotte, NC; Gallery F at the Scarrett-Bennett Center in Nashville, TN, where she was an artist-in-residence; and at group shows in Los Angeles, CA. While in quarantine during the pandemic, Carolyn began creating colorful mixed media frames for her photographs. 

Carolyn studied photography at SUNY Purchase; film, dramatic writing & art history at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts; and Art & Design at Watkins College, Nashville. She is a teaching artist, and frequent lecturer & panelist at international film festivals; and is an adjunct screenwriting instructor at New York Film Academy. 

She is currently developing an audio play of her photo series "Imaginary Bands + Their Fake Ass Songs". Audio essays from her memoir, INFLUENTIA, can be found on SoundCloud. Carolyn recently launched SuiteSee, a “multi-faceted production portal for comparative storytelling”. She resides in Southern California.