Lois "Elle" Johnson is an American television writer, producer, and showrunner.
Johnson grew up in Hollis, Queens in New York City. Her father was a parole officer and her uncle was a homicide detective. [1] [2] In 1981, her 16-year-old cousin was killed in a botched robbery at a Burger King in the Bronx. [3]
Johnson graduated from Harvard University in 1986 with an AB in art history. [2]
Given her family's background in law enforcement, Johnson's career as a writer and producer in television has centered around police procedurals and other police crime dramas, including Homicide: Life on the Street , CSI: Miami , Street Time , Law & Order , The Glades , and Bosch . Other shows she has worked on include Rescue 77 , Any Day Now , [2] Ghost Whisperer , [1] and The Fosters . [4]
Johnson, formerly a member of Writers Guild of America West, left and maintained financial core status in 1999. [5]
Johnson was an executive producer and co-showrunner for the 2020 Netflix miniseries Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam C. J. Walker . [4] [6] [7]
Johnson is the author of the memoir The Officer's Daughter, published by HarperCollins in 2021. The book focuses on the murder of her cousin and her relationship with her father. [3] [8] [9] [10]
HarperCollins Publishers LLC is an Anglo-American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette, Macmillan, and Simon & Schuster. HarperCollins is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Corp.
Madam C. J. Walker was an American entrepreneur, philanthropist, and political and social activist. She is recorded as the first female self-made millionaire in America in the Guinness Book of World Records. Multiple sources mention that although other women might have been the first, their wealth is not as well-documented.
Padma Parvati Lakshmi is an Indian-American author, model, activist, and television host. Born in India, Lakshmi immigrated to the United States as a child and was raised in California. She became a model before embarking on a career in television. Lakshmi hosted the cooking competition program Top Chef on Bravo continuously from 2006 to 2023. For her work, she received a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Reality Host in 2009 and 2020 through 2022. She is also the creator, host, and executive producer of the docuseries Taste the Nation with Padma Lakshmi, which premiered in June 2020 on Hulu. The series covers the food and culture of immigrant and indigenous communities across America.
Tom Fontana is an American screenwriter, writer, and television producer. Fontana worked on NBC's Homicide: Life on the Street and created HBO's Oz.
Ann Patchett is an American author. She received the 2002 PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction in the same year, for her novel Bel Canto. Patchett's other novels include The Patron Saint of Liars (1992), Taft (1994), The Magician's Assistant (1997), Run (2007), State of Wonder (2011), Commonwealth (2016), The Dutch House (2019), and Tom Lake (2023). The Dutch House was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Shonda Lynn Rhimes, is an American television producer and screenwriter, and founder of the production company Shondaland. Inducted into the Television Hall of Fame and NAB Broadcasting Hall of Fame, Rhimes became known as the showrunner—creator, head writer, and executive producer—of the medical drama Grey's Anatomy (2005–present), its spin-off Private Practice (2007–2013) and the political thriller Scandal (2012–2018), becoming the first woman to create three television dramas that have achieved the 100 episode milestone.
Arthur Carlton Cuse, known as Carlton Cuse, is an American screenwriter, showrunner, producer, and director, best known for the American television series Lost, for which he made the Time list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2010.
Jenji Leslie Kohan is an American television writer and producer. She is best known as the creator and showrunner of the Showtime comedy-drama series Weeds and the Netflix comedy-drama series Orange Is the New Black. She has received nine Emmy Award nominations, winning one as supervising producer of the comedy series Tracey Takes On....
Gillian Schieber Flynn is an American author, screenwriter, and producer. She is known for writing the thriller and mystery novels Sharp Objects (2006), Dark Places (2009), and Gone Girl (2012), which are all critically acclaimed. Her books have been published in 40 languages, and according to The Washington Post, as of 2016 Gone Girl alone has sold more than 15 million copies.
Kurt Leon Sutter is an American screenwriter, director, producer, and actor. He worked as a writer, director, and executive producer on The Shield, and appeared on the show as hitman Margos Dezerian. Sutter is also the creator of Sons of Anarchy and its spinoff Mayans M.C. on FX; he wrote, produced, and directed the series, as well as played incarcerated club member Otto Delaney. Sutter spent time with members of an outlaw motorcycle club in Northern California as research for Sons of Anarchy. Sutter's wife, actress Katey Sagal, played main character Gemma Teller.
Lily Jane Collins is a British and American actress. Born in Guildford and raised in Los Angeles, she began performing on screen at the age of two in the BBC sitcom Growing Pains. In the late 2000s, she began acting and modelling more regularly, and gained recognition for her supporting role in the sports drama film The Blind Side (2009). She went on to star in several films, including the horror film Priest (2011), the thriller Abduction (2011), and the fantasy films Mirror Mirror (2012) and The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (2013).
A'Lelia Perry Bundles is an American journalist, news producer and author, known for her 2001 biography of her great-great-grandmother Madam C. J. Walker.
Sera Gamble is an American television writer and producer, best known for her work on the Lifetime/Netflix series You, the Syfy series The Magicians and The CW series Supernatural.
Cylin Busby is an author and screenwriter, known for the best-selling true crime memoir, The Year We Disappeared, written with her father John Busby.
Nahnatchka Khan is an American television writer and producer. She created and executive produced the ABC comedy series Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 (2012–2013) and Fresh Off the Boat (2015–2020), and the NBC comedy series Young Rock (2021–2023). She also directed the streaming films Always Be My Maybe (2019) and Totally Killer (2023).
Attica Locke is an American fiction author and writer/producer for television and film.
Jenny Han is an American author, screenwriter, executive producer, and showrunner. She is best known for writing the The Summer I Turned Pretty trilogy, which she adapted into a TV series for Prime Video. She also wrote the To All the Boys trilogy which was adapted into a Netflix film series.
Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam C. J. Walker is an American drama television limited series, based on the biography On Her Own Ground by A'Lelia Bundles, that premiered on March 20, 2020, on Netflix. It received generally positive reviews with praise for Octavia Spencer's performance; however it received criticism for various historical inaccuracies and artistic licence. For her performance, Spencer received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie.
Morgan Jerkins is an American writer and editor. Her debut book, This Will Be My Undoing (2018), a collection of nonfiction essays, was a New York Times bestseller. Her second book, Wandering in Strange Lands, her memoir, was released in August 2020. She is currently an adjunct professor at Columbia University.
Blockbuster is an American workplace comedy television series created by Vanessa Ramos, who also serves as showrunner and is executive producer. Based upon the Blockbuster brand, the series stars Randall Park as Timmy, the manager in a fictionalized version of the last Blockbuster Video store, set in Grandville, Michigan. The series premiered on Netflix on November 3, 2022. In December 2022, the series was canceled after one season.