Jessica Gao (born January 2, 1984) is an American television writer and producer, who was creator and head writer of the TV series '' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law''. She also worked on the third season of ''

Rick and Morty {{Infobox television , image = Rick and Morty title card (cropped).png , alt = , caption = , genre = {{Plainlist, * Animated sitcom * Adult animation * Science fiction * Black comedy * ...

'', writing the episode " Pickle Rick", and wrote for ''Silicon Valley'', '' Robot Chicken'', ''

The Mighty B! ''The Mighty B!'' (stylized in all caps) is an American animated television series created by Amy Poehler, Cynthia True, and Erik Wiese for Nickelodeon. The series centers on Bessie Higgenbottom, an ambitious Honeybee girl scout who believes ...

'', '' Back at the Barnyard'', ''Star Wars: Detours'', and '' Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness''.

Career

Gao started her career as a writer on the

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Group. It ...

shows ''

'' and '' Back at the Barnyard''. She continued to work for the network on shows such as ''

Big Time Rush ''Big Time Rush'' is an American musical sitcom television series created by Scott Fellows that originally aired on Nickelodeon from November 28, 2009, to July 25, 2013 and is currently available in Paramount+. It focuses on the Hollywood misa ...

'' and '' Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness'', before leaving to freelance on other shows such as

Adult Swim Adult Swim (AS; stylized as dult swim'' and often abbreviated as s'') is an American adult-oriented night-time cable television channel that shares channel space with the basic cable network Cartoon Network and is programmed by its in-house ...

's '' Robot Chicken'', Cartoon Network's '' The High Fructose Adventures of Annoying Orange'', and

Disney XD Disney XD is an American pay television channel owned by the Disney Branded Television and Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution units of The Walt Disney Company. The channel is aimed primarily at older children ages six to eleven yea ...

's ''

Lab Rats A laboratory rat is a rat of the species ''Rattus norvegicus'' which is bred and kept for scientific research. Labrat, lab rat, or lab rats may also refer to: People and characters * Dunash ben Labrat (920–990), medieval Jewish commentator ...

''. Gao has also written for HBO's ''

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...

'', the French series ''

Zip Zip ''Zip Zip'' is a French animation, animated television series created by Aurore Damant, based on an original idea by Anne Ozannat. The series is produced by GO-N Productions with the participation of France Télévisions, Super RTL and The Walt Di ...

'',

Seeso Seeso was an over-the-top subscription streaming service owned by Comcast through NBCUniversal, launched on January 7, 2016, and closed on November 8, 2017. It provided comedy content such as original and broadcast television shows. History O ...

Pluto TV Pluto TV is a free, ad-supported video streaming service owned and operated by the Paramount Streaming division of Paramount Global. Co-founded by Tom Ryan, Ilya Pozin and Nick Grouf in 2013 and based in Los Angeles, California, in the United S ...

's ''

Bajillion Dollar Propertie$ ''Bajillion Dollar Propertie$'' is an American comedy series on the Seeso comedy subscription streaming service. The series, created by Kulap Vilaysack, is a semi-scripted parody of the reality television franchise ''Million Dollar Listing''. ' ...

'', and

Comedy Central Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programmin ...

's ''

Corporate A corporation is an organization—usually a group of people or a company—authorized by the state to act as a single entity (a legal entity recognized by private and public law "born out of statute"; a legal person in legal context) and r ...

''. She joined the writing room for the third season of ''Rick and Morty'', acting as story editor on six episodes and writing the episode " Pickle Rick". For writing "Pickle Rick", Gao won the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program at the 2018 Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards. While working on the show, Gao and the other female writers were subject to sexual harassment by members of the fanbase that were upset about the show hiring women in the writing room. Gao and ''Rick and Morty'' co-creator,

Dan Harmon Daniel James Harmon (born January 3, 1973) is an American writer, producer, and actor. He is best known as the creator and producer of the NBC/Yahoo! Screen sitcom ''Community'' (2009–2015), creator and host of the comedy podcast '' Harmontow ...

, collaborated on a podcast series entitled "Whiting Wongs" that discussed race and privilege in Hollywood. Gao also wrote and co-executive produced the second season of the show '' Take My Wife''. Gao left ''Rick and Morty'' after the third season to develop a sitcom for ABC, which landed a pilot episode order in 2019, directed by

Jude Weng Jude Weng (Chinese name: Weng Fei-fei/"翁菲菲") is a Taiwanese-born American director, writer and producer of episodic streaming/TV and feature films. Career Weng's episodic experience includes both multi- and single-camera half-hour comedies ...

. The show revolved around a Chinese-American woman's relationship with her family. ABC passed on the sitcom, but the series was being shopped to other networks. In July 2019, she was chosen to write the script for the upcoming movie based on ''

Sweet Valley High ''Sweet Valley High'' is a series of young adult novels attributed to American author Francine Pascal, who presided over a team of ghostwriters to produce the series. The books chronicle the lives of identical twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefi ...

''. In November 2019, she was hired as the lead writer for the

Disney+ Disney+ is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned and operated by the Media and Entertainment Distribution division of The Walt Disney Company. The service primarily distributes films and television se ...

show '' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law''.

Personal life

Gao is engaged to Truck Torrence, who is known for creating emojis of Marvel characters under the name 100 Soft.

Filmography

Awards and nominations

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Gao, Jessica Living people 1984 births American television writers American women screenwriters American women television writers Television producers from California American women television producers American writers of Chinese descent 21st-century American women writers 21st-century American screenwriters People from Hanford, California Screenwriters from California