Jason Katims (born November 30, 1960) is an American television writer, producer, and playwright. He is best known as the creator of several television series, including '' Relativity'' (1996), '' Roswell'' (1999–2002), '' Friday Night Lights'' (2006–2011), '' Parenthood'' (2010–2015), '' About a Boy'' (2014–2015) and ''

Rise Rise or RISE may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * '' Rise: The Vieneo Province'', an internet-based virtual world * Rise FM, a fictional radio station in the video game ''Grand Theft Auto 3'' * Rise Kujikawa, a vide ...

'' (2018).

Early life and family

Jason Katims was born to a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family in

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

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, New York, and raised first in Crown Heights and later in

Midwood Midwood is a neighborhood in the south-central part of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. It is bounded on the north by the Bay Ridge Branch tracks just above Avenue I and by the Brooklyn College campus of the City University of New York, a ...

.Esquire: "The Cult of Jason Katims. The man behind Friday Night Lights and Parenthood has a gift for making men a little verklempt. It's made him a power in traditional TV. Now he's betting on something entirely different" By Mike Sager
March 30, 2016 His father was an actor and a salesman; his mother, an English and philosophy major, "did some teachings". His parents were "very politically active, very left-leaning." He has an older brother and sister. Before studying theater at

Queens College Queens College (QC) is a public college in the Queens borough of New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. Its 80-acre campus is primarily located in Flushing, Queens. It has a student body representing more than 170 ...

Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...

, New York City, he graduated from Edward R. Murrow High School. He married his high school sweetheart; they have two children, Phoebe and Sawyer Katims.

Career

Katims was a playwright in New York until director and producer

Ed Zwick Edward M. Zwick (born October 8, 1952) is an American filmmaker and producer of film and television. He has worked primarily in the comedy drama and epic historical film genres, including ''About Last Night, Glory, Legends of the Fall,'' and ' ...

asked him if he wanted to write for television and films. In 1994, he wrote three episodes for the

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

teen drama ''

My So-Called Life ''My So-Called Life'' is an American teen drama television series created by Winnie Holzman and produced by Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz. It originally aired on ABC from August 25, 1994, to January 26, 1995. It is distributed by The B ...

''. He created '' Relativity'' in 1996 but the TV series was cancelled after 17 episodes. He subsequently created '' Roswell,'' which gained cult following. Katims worked on the

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

series '' Friday Night Lights'' as head writer and executive producer. He was nominated for a

Writers Guild of America Award The Writers Guild of America Awards is an award for film, television, and radio writing including both fiction and non-fiction categories given by the Writers Guild of America, East and Writers Guild of America West since 1949. Eligibility Th ...

for Best New Series at the February 2007 ceremony for his work on the first season of ''Friday Night Lights''. He was nominated for the WGA Award for Best Dramatic Series the following year at the February 2008 ceremony for his work on the second season of ''Friday Night Lights''. Katims was nominated for Best Dramatic Series a second time at the February 2009 ceremony for his work on the third season of ''Friday Night Lights''. He was nominated for the WGA Award for Best Drama Series for the third consecutive year at the February 2010 ceremony for his work on the fourth season. In 2011, he was honored by an award for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series in ''Friday Night Lights''. Katims is also the creator of and executive producer for another NBC series, '' Parenthood'', based on the feature film of the same name and a short-lived TV series that followed; Katims' series debuted in 2010 and ended in 2015. Katims based that series' Max Braverman character on his life with his own son, who has

Asperger syndrome Asperger syndrome (AS), also known as Asperger's, is a former neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by significant difficulties in Interpersonal relationship, social interaction and nonverbal communication, along with restricted and re ...

. Katims developed '' About a Boy'', a 2014 TV series based on the novel of the same name, for

. He has written a play, ''The Man Who Couldn't Dance'' and is a former member of Stagewrights, a playwriting collective in New York City. Katims also developed ''

Almost Family ''Almost Family'' is an American drama television series based on the Australian television series ''Sisters'', developed by Annie Weisman which aired from October 2, 2019, to February 22, 2020, on Fox. In March 2020, Fox canceled the series af ...

'', a 2019 TV series based on the Australian series ''

Sisters A sister is a woman or a girl who shares one or more parents with another individual; a female sibling. The male counterpart is a brother. Although the term typically refers to a familial relationship, it is sometimes used endearingly to refer to ...

'', for

Fox Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

. On June 15, 2020, Katims is the writer of ''As We See It'', based on Israeli series ''On the Spectrum'' for

Amazon Prime Video Amazon Prime Video, also known simply as Prime Video, is an American Video on demand#Subscription models, subscription video on-demand Over-the-top media service, over-the-top Streaming media, streaming and Renting, rental service of Amazon (c ...

. More recently, he signed a multi-year overall deal with

Imagine Television Imagine may refer to: * Imagination Music Albums * ''Imagine'' (Armin van Buuren album), 2008 * ''Imagine'' (Eva Cassidy album), 2002 * ''Imagine'' (Janice Vidal album), 2012 * ''Imagine'' (John Lennon album), 1971 ** ''Imagine: John Lennon ...

Filmography

Film

*''

The Pallbearer ''The Pallbearer'' is a 1996 American romantic comedy film co-written and directed by Matt Reeves in his directorial debut and starring David Schwimmer, Gwyneth Paltrow, Toni Collette, Michael Vartan, Michael Rapaport, and Barbara Hershey. It wa ...

'' (1996) *'' The Vow'' (2012)

Television

The numbers in directing and writing credits refer to the number of episodes.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Katims, Jason 1960 births 20th-century American dramatists and playwrights American soap opera writers Television producers from New York City American male television writers 20th-century American Jews Living people Writers from Brooklyn Primetime Emmy Award winners Showrunners American male screenwriters American male dramatists and playwrights Queens College, City University of New York alumni 20th-century American male writers Screenwriters from New York (state) People from Midwood, Brooklyn People from Crown Heights, Brooklyn Edward R. Murrow High School alumni 21st-century American Jews