Cara Buono

Acting

Cara Buono

Born 1971-03-01 · The Bronx, New York City, New York, USA

Born in The Bronx, New York, Buono was raised in a blue-collar family and decided at an early age to make acting her life's ambition. At 11, she showed her connection to her family's work ethic by answering a casting call ad for Harvey Fierstein's "Spookhouse" and landing the role, without any assistance from her family or other adults. Buono began landing roles on television and the New York stage while in her teens and early twenties, and earned a Daytime Emmy nomination as a young victim of sexual abuse in Abby, My Love (1991) (CBS, 1991), which aired as part of the CBS Schoolbreak Special (1984). She soon graduated to minor roles in Stephen Gyllenhaal's Waterland (1992), with Jeremy Irons and Ethan Hawke; as an illegal immigrant in The Cowboy Way (1994), with Woody Harrelson and Kiefer Sutherland; and in Noah Baumbach's much-loved indie comedy, Kicking and Screaming (1995), which reunited her with her "Abby, My Love" co-star, Josh Hamilton. While cultivating her acting career, Buono also graduated from Columbia University with a double major in English and political science in 1995, which she earned in just three years. After graduation, Buono concentrated largely on character roles in independent films and on television. She was the wife and confidante of prison guard Robert Sean Leonard, who served as an earpiece for monstrous 1930s criminal Carl Panzram (James Woods) in Killer: A Journal of Murder (1995), before playing an accident-prone opera singer in love with a young man (Gibson Frazier) with Jazz-Era affectations in the offbeat Man of the Century (1999). She soon added behind-the-camera credits to her expanding resume, including writer/director on the short, Baggage (1997), with Liev Schreiber and Minnie Driver, and served as co-producer and star of the comedy, Two Ninas (1999), about a pair of similarly monikered women (Buono and Amanda Peet) who fell for a very unlucky man. She continues to write and co-wrote "When the Cat's Away" (1999), with Brad Anderson, and wrote an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's first novel, "This Side of Paradise". Buono's screen credits grew more obscure at the launch of the new millennium - art house and film festival circles saw the lesbian drama, Chutney Popcorn (1999), Attention Shoppers (2000), Happy Accidents (2000) with Marisa Tomei and Vincent D'Onofrio. She soon turned to television for wider exposure, and earned it through supporting roles on high profile series like Third Watch (1999) and The Sopranos (1999). In 2007, she joined the cast of the cult favorite, The Dead Zone (2002) (USA, 2002-2007) as Sheriff Anna Turner, who investigated the death of her predecessor (Chris Bruno). During this period, Buono maintained her screen career in features as varied as Ang Lee's Hulk (2003), playing David Banner's mother, who was killed by his genetically-induced rage, and Beer League (2006), and Artie Lange's hapless lay-about love interest. In 2010, she appeared as the divorced mother of Kodi Smit-McPhee in Let Me In (2010), the critically-praised American remake of the Swedish vampire movie, Let the Right One In (2008). That same year, she landed her most widely seen role-to-date on Mad Men (2007), playing Dr. Faye Miller. For her efforts, Buono received an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series in 2011.

Acting credits

Hulk poster
5.6

Bruce Banner, a genetics researcher with a tragic past, suffers massive radiation exposure in his laboratory that causes him to transform into a raging green monster when he gets angry.

Hulk

2003

Let Me In poster
6.8

A bullied young boy befriends a young female vampire who lives in secrecy with her guardian. A remake of the movie “Let The Right One In” which was an adaptation of a book.

Let Me In

2010

Gladiator poster
7.6

Tommy Riley has moved with his dad to Chicago from a 'nice place'. He keeps to himself, goes to school. However, after a street fight, he's noticed and quickly falls into the world of illegal underground boxing — where punches can kill.

Gladiator

1992

One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5 poster
7.2

An inside look at the years of effort and craft that went into the final installment of the Duffer Brothers' generation-defining series.

One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5

2026

The Debut poster
NR

When Mona Friedman is cast in a bit part at a small community theater, she transforms from a shy, unassuming housewife into a zealous method actor willing to do anything to protect the artistic integrity of her marginal role—even if it means waging war against the show’s domineering director.

The Debut

2026

Happy Accidents poster
6.8

A comedy that pays tribute to the science fiction genre -- specifically, the sub-genre of time travel. But here the alternate reality is contemporary New York City where past and future experiences of trust, commitment and denial are cleverly put to the test. Just as Ruby is beginning to relish her first-ever healthy relationship, Sam begins muttering about being a time traveler from the year 2470.

Happy Accidents

2000

Paper Towns poster
6.2

Quentin Jacobsen has spent a lifetime loving the magnificently adventurous Margo Roth Spiegelman from afar. So when she cracks open a window and climbs back into his life dressed like a ninja and summoning him for an ingenious campaign of revenge, he follows. After their all-nighter ends and a new day breaks, Quentin arrives at school to discover that Margo, always an enigma, has now become a mystery. But Quentin soon learns that there are clues, and they're for him. Urged down a disconnected path, the closer Quentin gets, the less he sees of the girl he thought he knew.

Paper Towns

2015

The Girl Who Escaped: The Kara Robinson Story poster
7.1

Based on a true story. 15-year-old Kara Robinson was kidnapped, assaulted and held captive for 18 hours. With her survival instincts kicking in, she plots a daring escape from the serial killer and leads police to his apartment.

The Girl Who Escaped: The Kara Robinson Story

2023

A Good Marriage poster
5.3

After 25 years of a good marriage, what will Darcy do once she discovers her husband's sinister secret?

A Good Marriage

2014

Emily & Tim poster
5.6

The movie is comprised of six vignettes. A look at the tumultuous marriage of Tim and Emily Hanratty over half a century.

Emily & Tim

2015

Takedown poster
6.1

Kevin Mitnick is quite possibly the best hacker in the world. Hunting for more and more information, seeking more and more cyber-trophies every day, he constantly looks for bigger challenges. When he breaks into the computer of a security expert and an ex-hacker, he finds one - and much more than that...

Takedown

2000

The Cowboy Way poster
5.7

Two championship rodeo partners travel to New York to find their missing friend, Nacho Salazar who went missing there.

The Cowboy Way

1994

Waterland poster
6.3

The story of a mentally anguished high school history teacher going through a complete reassessment of his life. His method for reassessing his life is to narrate it to his class and interweave in it three generations of his family's history.

Waterland

1992

The Bad Seed poster
7.1

A widower suspects that his seemingly perfect adolescent daughter is a heartless killer.

The Bad Seed

2018

Queen of the Ring poster
6.7

In a time when pro wrestling for women was illegal all over the country, a small town single mother embraces the danger to change culture as she dominates America's most masculine sport to become the first million dollar female athlete in history.

Queen of the Ring

2025

Monsters and Men poster
5.8

After capturing an illegal act of police violence on his cellphone, a Brooklyn street hustler sets off a series of events that alter the lives of a local police officer and a star high-school athlete.

Monsters and Men

2018

Beer League poster
5.1

An unemployed slacker inspires his softball teammates to improve their game to avoid getting kicked out of the local league.

Beer League

2006

All Saints poster
6.2

Michael Spurlock decides to trade in his corporate sales career to become a pastor. Unfortunately, his first assignment is to close a country church and sell the prime piece of land where it sits. He soon has a change of heart when the church starts to welcome refugees from Burma. Spurlock now finds himself working with the refugees to turn the land into a working farm to pay the church's bills.

All Saints

2017

Kicking and Screaming poster
6.2

After college graduation, Grover's girlfriend Jane tells him she's moving to Prague to study writing. Grover declines to accompany her, deciding instead to move in with several friends, all of whom can't quite work up the inertia to escape their university's pull. Nobody wants to make any big decisions that would radically alter his life, yet none of them wants to end up like Chet, the professional student who tends bar and is in his tenth year of university studies.

Kicking and Screaming

1995

Attention Shoppers poster
4.3

An actor's promotional appearance at a new shopping centre is ruined when a popular rival shows up at a nearby store.

Attention Shoppers

2000

Next Stop Wonderland poster
6.0

Dumped by her loser boyfriend, Erin's love life hits rock bottom when her overbearing mother places an embarrassing ad in the "personals" section of a local newspaper on her behalf. Erin's disgust turns to curiosity as she searches for the right guy in a hilarious series of disastrous dates. Meanwhile, a lonely ex-plumber named Alan clumsily searches for his dream job while narrowly missing one chance meeting with Erin after another.

Next Stop Wonderland

1998

Drew Peterson: Untouchable poster
5.3

The story of Drew Peterson, who is charged with the death of his third wife after the mysterious disappearance of his fourth wife.

Drew Peterson: Untouchable

2014

Killer: A Journal of Murder poster
5.8

Carl Panzram is sent to Leavenworth Prison for burglary. While there, he is brutally beaten by a guard. Neophyte guard Henry Lesser feels sympathy for Panzram, befriends him, and gets him to write his life story. Lesser learns that Panzram's past is much more violent than he thought, but also that he's capable of being a much better person than the rest of the prison staff believes - or so Lesser thinks.

Killer: A Journal of Murder

1996

No artwork available
NR

American tv movie with no plot outline available on the imdb

Modern Love

2012

Behind the camera