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Cheri Caffaro (born April 29, 1945)1 is an American actress and writer-producer best known for her starring roles in a series of low-budget exploitation action films in the early 1970s, most notably the "Ginger" trilogy. Her final screen credit was a guest voice role in the animated series Extreme Ghostbusters in 1997.2
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Caffaro grew up in Pasadena, California.3 At fifteen years old in 1960, she won a Brigitte Bardot look-alike contest that was reported on by Life magazine.4 She subsequently worked as a model through the 1960s before transitioning to acting.3
Caffaro's film career began in 1971, largely in collaboration with director Don Schain, who was also her husband at the time.3 Schain had run a Manhattan theatre before moving into independent filmmaking,5 and the pair built a small body of grindhouse and sexploitation pictures together.
Her signature role was Ginger McAllister, a tough, resourceful private investigator and undercover operative who appeared across three films.3 The character's combination of action-hero competence and provocative material was unusual for female leads of the era. Caffaro performed her own stunts throughout the series.6
The "Ginger" trilogy:
Ginger ran in theaters for more than a year and generated the two sequels. Other film credits from the period include Up Your Alley (1971), A Place Called Today (1972), Savage Sisters (1974), and Too Hot to Handle (1977).1 She also had a television appearance on the crime drama Baretta.1
In 1979, Caffaro stepped into a writer and co-producer role for the ensemble sex comedy H.O.T.S., demonstrating range beyond performing.3
Caffaro's last recorded screen credit was a guest voice role in Extreme Ghostbusters, the 1997 animated series that continued the Ghostbusters franchise with a new team of student investigators. She appeared in the episode Back in the Saddle: Part 2, the second half of a two-part story that reunited the original Ghostbusters with the new team.2
After this appearance, Caffaro retired from the entertainment industry.
Caffaro was married to director Don Schain from 1971 to 1982.5 Schain directed nearly all of her film appearances during that period. Following her retirement from acting after 1997, she has lived in Los Angeles.
Some content on this page was researched using the Ghostbusters Wiki on Fandom.
"Cheri Caffaro," IMDb, accessed 2026-06-13, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0128410/. ↩ ↩2 ↩3
Spook Central, "Extreme Ghostbusters Episode Guide: Back in the Saddle, Part 2" (December 4, 1997), https://theraffon.net/spook-central-extreme-ghostbusters-episode-guide-back-in-the-saddle-part-2/. ↩ ↩2
"Cheri Caffaro," Wikipedia, accessed 2026-06-13, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheri_Caffaro. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5
Life (November 28, 1960); Life (December 5, 1960). Both issues cited in "Cheri Caffaro," Wikipedia, accessed 2026-06-13, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheri_Caffaro. ↩
"Don Schain," Wikipedia, accessed 2026-06-13, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Schain (describes Schain as "Manhattan theatre owner," married Caffaro 1971, divorced 1982). See also: "Don Schain, producer behind 'High School Musical,' Utah's movie industry, dies at 74," Salt Lake Tribune (December 26, 2015), https://archive.sltrib.com/article.php?id=3387379&itype=CMSID (Schain began in film distribution with the Walter Reed Theatres chain before relocating to Los Angeles in 1971 to pursue filmmaking). ↩ ↩2
JRSploitation.com, "Actress Cheri Caffaro Was 'Made For Loving' And A Wild 'Ginger' Too!" (June 1, 2022), https://jrsploitation.com/2022/06/01/actress-cheri-caffaro-was-made-for-loving-and-a-wild-ginger-too-heres-her-story/. Caffaro stated: "I also performed my own stunts and advocated martial arts for women." ↩
