Neil Landau Biography

Neil Landau is an American screenwriter, playwright, producer, and director. His film and television credits include the teen comedy Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead, Melrose Place, The Magnificent Seven, Doogie Howser, M.D., The Secret World of Alex Mack and MTV's Undressed. He has developed numerous one-hour drama TV pilots for several studios and networks including Warner Bros., Touchstone, CBS, ABC Family, and Lifetime, and has written movies for Universal Pictures, Disney, Columbia Pictures, and 20th Century Fox.

He is currently rewriting an animated feature based on the popular "Tadeo Jones" comic books for El Toro and Warner Bros. Pictures, for whom he also worked as executive script consultant on the film Lope, which was short-listed for an Academy Award as Best Foreign Film. He is slated as executive script consultant for the upcoming El Toro/Universal Pictures film "Bruc".

Neil has also worked internationally as both co-head-writer and executive script consultant on television and film projects for Sony Pictures Television International (in Russia), Freemantle Media (in Australia), and Intereconomia (in Spain).

Neil recently served as Executive Vice-President of Scripted Development for Amedia Film Group located in Moscow (Russia), working with writers, creative producers, story editors, and studio executives, guiding a slate of original projects including feature films, animation, miniseries, made-for-television movies, one-hour drama series, situation comedies, soap operas, and historical docudramas.

Neil teaches in the MFA in Screenwriting and Producing Programs at both UCLA School of Film & Television and USC School of Cinematic Arts. He is also a faculty advisor in the MFA in Writing Program at Goddard College.

His first book, "101 Things I Learned in Film School" (Grand Central Publishing), was published in May 2010. He is also a contributor to the anthology "WriteNow! Screenwriting" (Tarcher/Penguin); published in September 2010.

Television credits

Writing

The Young and the Restless (hired by Lynn Marie Latham): Breakdown Writer

• Monarch Cove: Script Consultant
• Doogie Howser, M.D.
• The Secret World of Alex Mack
• Melrose Place
• The Magnificent Seven
• Undressed (Co-Head Writer)
• Twice in a Lifetime (Supervising Producer)

Directing

• The Fred Astaire Complex

Theatrical credits

• Johnny on the Spot

Awards and nominations

• The Fred Astaire Complex: Grand Prize by the California Media Association
• Etcetera and Intentions: Best Play-L.A. Valley College One-Act Play Festival Bank of America Award for Drama Excellence
• UCLA: Outstanding Instructor of the Year 1994