Credit on a popular Netflix show that hit screens last month was just one small part of a steady rise to success for a Bermudian screenwriter and director.

Kara Smith’s name appears in the list of people who contributed to Kaos.

The new series stars Jeff Goldblum as Zeus in the modern spin on Greek mythology from Charlie Covell, the same creator of the worldwide cult phenomenon The End of the F***ing World.

However, Ms Smith said she was just a junior in the profession when she contributed ideas to the show as part of a group of writers back in 2018.

She has had much more influence in roles in recent years including as supervising producer across all episodes of the Hulu drama series Black Cake, as well as a writer on episode 4.

The show, from Marissa Jo Cerar, Oprah Winfrey and Aaron Kaplan’s Kapital Entertainment, aired in 2023 in the United States and early 2024 in Britain.

Ms Smith also wrote for several of Britain’s highly acclaimed streaming series including HBO/Sky’s horror-comedy The Baby [episode 5]; Netflix’s new genre series Lockwood & Co [episode 2] from Joe Cornish; Amazon’s Anansi Boys, created by Neil Gaiman; and the AMC+ and Sid Gentle series Ragdoll [episode 5].

Spending her time working between London and Los Angeles, she has come a long way since leaving Bermuda in 2009 to launch her career.

Ms Smith told The Royal Gazette: “Kaos was more difficult as I was at the beginning of my career.

“I am credited as an early writer but Charlie Covell came to the show with clear ideas of what she wanted. Other shows need more development.

“After Kaos, I went on to do so many projects. I started The Baby in 2018 which was on HBO and Sky Atlantic. I was a writer on that.

“I wrote episode 2 for Lockwood and Co, based on a popular book series, for Netflix, which came out last year. The creator, Joe Cornish, also did the film Attack the Block.

“I went on to do Ragdoll — that was made by the creators of crime thriller show Killing Eve and it aired on AMC.

“As a writer working in TV, you want to become a show runner — the creator of your own show.

“With Black Cake, which aired in the winter of 2023 in America on Hulu and in the UK on Disney+, I was a supervising producer as well as a writer.

“That means, in addition to being in the writers’ room and delivering scripts, I was also producing. In two of the locations we had about 500 cast and crew — it was really big.

“Black Cake was National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People Award-nominated earlier this year but we lost to Bridgerton.”

Ms Cerar, Black Cake’s show runner, creator and executive producer, went on to win a Meritas Prize for the series.

Ms Smith, who is the niece of former premier Dame Jennifer Smith, was raised in Hamilton Parish and attended Francis Patton Primary School before going to Warwick Academy.

She finished high school at Albert College in Canada and went on to complete undergraduate and master’s degrees in screenwriting from the University of Westminster in London.

These years were challenging as Ms Smith was also raising her son, Judah, as a single mother.

In 2012 she won the grand prize for original TV drama in the Hollywood Screenplay Contest for her 60-minute pilot episode of Parole, and she was the first Bermudian to be shortlisted for the Ustinov Award for TV writers under the age of 30 at the International Emmy Awards.

Her short film Life Anonymous was screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 2013.

She teamed up with her sister, Karli Smith, a producer and director for Paramount, on the short film Blotter, which also showed at Cannes in 2015.

The next year, along with her sister and film-maker Lucinda Spurling, she worked on TheBerkeley Project, a documentary exploring desegregation in education, which was screened at the Bermuda International Film Festival.

Ms Smith, who also has a postgraduate degree in psychology and an undergraduate degree in public relations, said she has always wanted to be a writer.

She said: “I get to tell stories all the time. I think it is so special to be able to explore different characters and worlds.

“It is wonderful to represent diverse characters, especially coming from an island, which gives me a unique perspective.

“I am still influenced by the experiences I had growing up — being in proximity to nature and the water, and being from a community that is much more intimate.

“London is not like that at all. Arsenal stadium can hold the population of Bermuda. I feel blessed and special to be Bermudian.”

If she could offer any advice to aspiring writers in Bermuda, it would be to write regularly.

She said: “It sounds obvious but sometimes in this industry we have to turn in a script very quickly, maybe a week to write a draft that will be submitted to the studio of a network. You need the practice of writing and to tap into your inspiration.

“Connect with other writers because you need feedback from people you trust and who are honest.

“There are also opportunities on the island. We are planning on doing a couple of projects in Bermuda.

“We are working on an art project around Aids. Family members of those who passed want to honour them and from that came the idea for an audio documentary and portraiture.

“I am also working on a script in Bermuda inspired by my life and being a young mom. I’d like to direct it in Bermuda. When we create infrastructure around the project, I would love there to be a fleet of Bermudian screenwriters.”