Caroline Libresco

Principal Consultant and Co-Founder

Caroline Libresco is a leading film curator, creative producer, program designer/strategist, and story advisor fueled by the conviction that independent film is a critical pillar of a pluralistic democracy. In 2020, she wrapped 19 years as one of the head programmers at the Sundance Film Festival, where she co-led documentary and international competitions. At Sundance, she was also founding director/chief curator of Sundance Catalyst, where she built a community of 100+ investors, raising $33+ million for 90 projects, including Truffle Hunters, Crip Camp, Social Dilemma, Won’t You Be My Neighbor, Sorry to Bother You, and The Witch. She also co-founded the Sundance Producing Program and created the Sundance Women’s Program, generating groundbreaking research and a fellowship supporting dozens of now well-known directors including Janicza Bravo, Ramona Diaz, Sydney Freeland, Marielle Heller, Eliza Hittman, and Grace Lee. Prior to Sundance, she held program and communications positions at Independent Television Service (ITVS), the San Francisco Film Festival, and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. She was also associate director of development at UC Berkeley and the San Francisco Library Foundation. 

In 2021, in collaboration with Kate Capshaw and Steven Spielberg’s Righteous Persons Foundation, she co-founded, and is now principal program consultant to, Jewish Story Partners, a philanthropic fund which has awarded $5 million to 130 documentaries. Among these are Steal This Story, Please!, Sabbath Queen, and the Oscar-shortlisted films Coexistence My Ass!, Holding Liat, My Undesirable Friends, A Still Small Voice, and Last Flight Home.

For 25 years, Caroline has been an active creative producer and writer/story consultant. Credits include Sundance 2023 entry Food and Country (producer/story producer), Peabody-winner American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs (producer), Tribeca jury prize winner Sunset Story (producer), Fanci’s Persuasion (writer/producer) starring MacArthur genius Justin Bond, and Barrier Device (producer) starring Sandra Oh. She executive produced We Are Pat (Paramount+), Our American Family (AMC), and Disclosure (Netflix Original), and was consulting producer on SXSW-winner Shuffle, HBO’s Power of Story series, and Monk in Pieces (Berlin FF).

She led the HotDocs Blue Ice Story Lab for several years and has been a creative advisor at East Doc Platform, FIND DocLab, DokIncubator, and NALIP Story Lab. As a strategic and programmatic consultant to financiers and organizations, her clients have included Catapult Film Fund, AGC Studios, Harvard Kennedy School, and the Zurich Film Festival. She has juried dozens of film festivals including Big Sky, Cartagena, CPH:Dox, HotDocs, Istanbul, IDFA, Jerusalem, OneWorld (Prague), OutFest, Santiago (Chile), Sarajevo, Seattle, Sheffield, and Thessaloniki Documentary film festivals. She has also served as nominator for such awards as Chicken & Egg Pictures Breakthrough, Harvard Gleitsman Citizen Activist, United States Artists, McKnight Fellowships, and the MacArthur Genius Award, and is a frequent panel moderator and artist interviewer. 

Caroline is a founding board member of Vista House, an AMPAS member, and formerly served on the boards of IDA and Women Make Movies. She holds degrees from Oberlin (BA), Harvard Divinity School (MA), and UCLA Film School (MFA).