LARA SFIRE (she/her) is an award-winning filmmaker with a focus on female-centered stories. Based in Detroit (formerly in NY), she has worked for over a decade on independent and commercial films and TV shows (Half Nelson, Ugly Betty, 30 Rock, Unbreakable Kimmie Schmit), non-profit PSAs and directed shorts, music videos and a TV pilot.

Before receiving an MFA in directing from Tisch School of the Arts, she worked on HBO, NETFLIX, NBC/PEACOCK, HULU, COMEDY CENTRAL, CBS, DISNEY, APPLE + productions, as well as films which premiered at Sundance, Toronto, Tribeca Film Festivals and stream on Criterion. She worked at the Sundance Institute’s Director’s lab and Kresge Arts in Detroit as a series producer.

Most recently, Lara co-founded and owned The Film Lab (a Knight Foundation and MCACA grantee), a microcinema for filmmakers to gather and screen films. Currently, she is collaborating on a short doc with Planned Parenthood and developing a dark comedy TV pilot (winner of OBB Pictures Pilot Season Program) about a single mother in Detroit, called V in the D.

Lara lives in Detroit overlooking the bridge to Canada, with her twin sons and twin cats. She takes great pride in becoming a viral meme wearing a Vagina costume during the inaugural Women’s March, which still resurfaces on right wing posts to this day.