Biography
This page uses content from the Steven Bochco biography page on the English version of Wikipedia and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. This list of authors can be seen in the page history. Rotten Tomatoes disclaims any and all warranties as to the accuracy or reliability of the content.
Steven Ronald Bochco (born December 16, 1943) is an American television producer and writer. He has been involved in a number of popular hits including Hill Street Blues, L.A. Law and NYPD Blue.
Biography
Bochco was born in New York City into an Italian family. His parents were both artistic, his mother a painter, his father a violinist. He was educated in Manhattan at the High School of Music and Art. In 1961, he enrolled at the Carnegie Institute of Technology (after merging with the Mellon Institute in 1967 known as Carnegie Mellon University]] in Pittsburgh to study playwriting and theater. He graduated with a BFA in Theater in 1966, having also had an MCA Writing Fellowship.
He went to work for Universal Studios as a writer and then story editor on Ironside, Columbo, McMillan and Wife and the flops Griff, Delvecchio and The Invisible Man. He wrote the screenplay for the 1968 TV movie The Counterfeit Killer and worked on Silent Running (1972) and Double Indemnity (1973). He left Universal in 1978 to go to MTM Enterprises where he had greater scope for producing.
He achieved major success for NBC with the police drama Hill Street Blues. It ran from 1981 to 1987 and Bochco was credited as co-creator and also wrote and produced. Despite critical acclaim and awards the series was never very lucrative. Bochco was fired from MTM in 1985 following the failure of his (1983) Bay City Blues baseball project.
Bochco moved to Twentieth Century Fox (which ironically now owns the MTM library) where he made as creator and executive producer, L.A. Law (1986-1994), first aired on NBC. In 1987 Bochco created the half-hour dramedy Hooperman which starred John Ritter and lasted two seasons, despite Bochco offering to take over direct day-to-day control of a third season.
He was given a lucrative deal with ABC in 1987 to create and executive-produce ten new TV series, forming 'Steven Bochco Productions'. From this deal came Doogie Howser, M.D. (1989-1993) and the 1990 musical flop Cop Rock, which notoriously combined straight police drama with live-action Broadway singing and dancing. It was one of his most high-profile failures.
After a lull he came back with the controversial, by network standards, NYPD Blue (1993-2005) with David Milch. He created the show with the express intention of changing the nature of network one-hour drama to compete with the more adult fare broadcast on cable networks. Other projects in this period that failed to take off include Murder One (1995-1997); Brooklyn South (1997); City of Angels (2000), Philly (2001), and Over There (2005). All four shows failed to match Bochco's earlier success though "Murder One" and "Over There" garnered critical praise and have developed cult followings.
In 2005, Bochco took charge of Commander in Chief (2005-2006) which was the creation of Rod Lurie and brought in a new writing team. However, in Spring 2006, he left the show because of conflicts with ABC. Shortly afterward the program was cancelled. Bochco has completed a pilot ABC show, Hollis and Rae, and is said to be developing a baseball drama and another legal drama for ABC in partnership with Chris Gerolmo.
His impact on the nature of American primetime network television drama is considerable: prior to Hill Street Blues it was rare for American straight drama shows to have story arcs, i.e. several stories running over many episodes (with the exception of primetime soaps such as Dallas). It was also rare to have a large regular cast. The structure of the modern 'ensemble' television drama comes from Bochco who many regard as having changed the 'language' of television drama.
He married actress Barbara Bosson (b. 1939) in 1969. They divorced in 1998. He is currently married to Dayna Kalins (m. August 12, 2000).
Awards
Emmy Awards
- 1981 Outstanding Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues
- 1981 Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues, "Hill Street Station" (premiere episode)
- 1982 Outstanding Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues
- 1982 Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues, "Freedom's Last Stand"
- 1983 Outstanding Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues
- 1984 Outstanding Drama Series, for Hill Street Blues
- 1987 Outstanding Drama Series, for L.A. Law
- 1987 Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series, for L.A. Law, "The Venus Butterfly"
- 1989 Outstanding Drama Series, for L.A. Law
- 1995 Outstanding Drama Series, for NYPD Blue
Humanitas Prize
- 1981 60-minute Category, for Hill Street Blues
- 1999 90-Minute Category, for NYPD Blue
Edgar Awards
- 1982 Best Episode in a TV Series Teleplay, for Hill Street Blues, "Hill Street Station"
- 1995 Best Episode in a TV Series Teleplay, for NYPD Blue, "Simone Says"
Directors Guild of America
- 1999 Diversity Award
Writers Guild of America
- 1994 Laurel Award for TV Writing Achievement
Bibliography
- Death by Hollywood (2003)
External links
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