Karen Chilton is a New York-based writer-actor, born on the South Side of Chicago. She earned her Master of Fine Arts degree in Dramatic Writing from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics from Bradley University. Additionally, she received extensive musical training in classical piano from The Chicago Conservatory of Music.
Chilton's writing credits include several notable plays, such as Afrodisiac, a finalist for the 2020 Goldberg Prize, Heirloom, a semi-finalist for the 2019 O'Neill National Playwrights Conference, and Convergence, the winner of the New Professional Theatre's Writers Festival. She also wrote and performed the libretto for The Soul Now Sings, a collaboration with pianist Damien Sneed, produced by NPR-New York Public Radio.
Her short plays have been featured in several festivals, including 48 Hours in Harlem and The Fire This Time, and she is the recipient of the 2020-2021 Liberation Theatre's Playwriting Fellowship. Her one-act play, Brothermine, is currently in development with Plowshares Theatre in Detroit, and her solo performance piece, Saying Grace, was produced in the Women of Color Theater Festival at Henry Street Settlement in New York City.
Chilton is also the author of several books, including the critically-acclaimed biography of jazz pianist Hazel Scott: The Pioneering Journey of a Jazz Pianist from Café Society to Hollywood to HUAC, which she recently adapted for the screen. She is also the co-author of the jazz memoir I Wish You Love, written with legendary vocalist Gloria Lynne.
As an actress, Chilton has appeared on the New York stage, in episodic television, and in several independent films. She had a supporting role in the award-winning film Half Nelson, directed by Ryan Fleck and starring Ryan Gosling, and was a principal in the short film version of that feature, Gowanus, Brooklyn, which won the 2004 Sundance Film Festival Short Film Jury Prize.
Chilton has also received several awards for her voiceover work, including the 2020 Audie Award for Nonfiction Narration for her narration of Grace Will Lead Us Home: The Charleston Church Massacre and the Hard, Inspiring Journey to Forgiveness by Jennifer Berry Hawes.
