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Faculty
Tara Mallen
A producer, actor, and director, Tara is also the founder and Artistic Director at Chicago’s award-winning Rivendell Theatre Ensemble. She is a 3Arts William Franklin Grisham Awardee, a 2024 Impact Award winner from the Chicago Foundation for Women, and a Volunteers of America Silver Star Award. In 2024, Tara appeared alongside her husband and daughter in Alex Thompson and Kelly O'Sullivan's film Ghostlight, which premiered at Sundance to critical and audience acclaim alike and was subsequently released by IFC Films. She stars alongside her daughter, Katherine Mallen Kupferer, in O’Sullivan and Thompson’s soon-to-be-released feature Mouse, a breakout hit at the 2026 Berlin International Film Festival. Tara was most recently onstage in Rivendell's sold-out world premiere production of PIVOT as well as the world premieres of GORGEOUS (co-production between Rivendell and Raven) and Rivendell’s smash-hit productions of Motherhouse (2024 Jeff Award - Best Ensemble) and The Cake (2018 Jeff Award - Actor in a Principal Role). Other notable stage credits include The Luckiest (Raven Theatre - Jeff Nomination – Supporting Actor); the world premiere of Lynn Nottage’s Sweat (Arena Stage); Rivendell’s world premiere productions of Laura and the Sea, Look, We Are Breathing, and Rasheeda Speaking, among many others; and How Long Will I Cry at Steppenwolf Theatre. She received a Joseph Jefferson award for “Supporting Actress” for work in WRENS and was also a part of that production’s Jeff-winning “ensemble”. She was nominated the following year for “Actress in a Principal Role” for her work in My Simple City. Tara recently directed the Rolling World Premiere of the critically acclaimed WIPEOUT by Aurora Real De Asua. She co-conceived and directed the world premiere of WOMEN AT WAR, directed the Jeff nominated Midwest premieres of The Electric Baby, 26 Miles (co-production with Teatro Vista); Fighting Words; Psalms of a Questionable Nature; Elliot, a Soldier’s Fugue (co-production with Stageworks/ Hudson); and the brief and brilliant Shady Meadows by Lisa Dillman as part of the 2007 Chicago Humanities Festival.
Additional screen credits include the indie feature Via Negativa (premiering in June 2026 at the Tribeca Film Festival); Saturn Returns (Netflix); Steven Soderbergh’s Contagion; The Last Shift (Sony Pictures); The Emperor of Ocean Park (MGM+); Dark Matter (Apple TV); Empire (Fox); Boss (Starz); Chicago Fire (NBC); Doubt (CBS/Sony Pictures); Chicago P.D.(NBC); Sense8 (Netflix) and the independent feature FOOLS.
