Steven Bochco | |
|---|---|
 Bochco in 1994 | |
| Born | Steven Ronald Bochco December 16, 1943 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | April 1, 2018(2018-04-01) (aged 74) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Education | Carnegie Mellon University (BFA) |
| Occupation(s) | Television producer, writer |
| Years active | 1961–2016 |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 3, includingJesse |
| Relatives | Joanna Frank (sister) |
Steven Ronald Bochco (December 16, 1943 – April 1, 2018) was an American television writer and producer. He developed a number of television series, mostly crime dramas, includingHill Street Blues;L.A. Law;Doogie Howser, M.D.;Cop Rock; andNYPD Blue.
Bochco was born to aJewish family[1] in New York City, the son of Mimi, a painter, and Rudolph Bochco, a concert violinist and Polish immigrant.[2][3] He was educated inManhattan at theHigh School of Music and Art. His elder sister is actressJoanna Frank.[citation needed]
In 1961, he enrolled atCarnegie Institute of Technology (now known asCarnegie Mellon University after merging with theMellon Institute in 1967) inPittsburgh to study playwriting and theater. He graduated with aBachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in Theater in 1966, having also had an MCA Writing Fellowship.[4]
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Bochco went to work forUniversal Pictures'television division as a writer and then story editor onIronside,Columbo,McMillan & Wife, and the short-livedLorne Greene andBen Murphy seriesGriff, as well asDelvecchio andThe Invisible Man.[citation needed]
He wrote the story and teleplay for theColumbo episode "Murder by the Book" (1971), and the teleplays for several other episodes. He wrote the screenplay for the 1968 filmThe Counterfeit Killer and worked onSilent Running (1972) andDouble Indemnity (1973). He left Universal in 1978 to go toMTM Enterprises where he had greater scope for producing. His first effort there was the short-livedCBS police dramaParis, notable as the first series on whichJames Earl Jones played a lead role.[citation needed]
He achieved major success forNBC with the police dramaHill Street Blues. It ran from 1981 to 1987 and Bochco was credited as co-creator along withMichael Kozoll, also writing and producing. The series also garnered considerable critical acclaim and many awards, and was nominated for a total of 98Emmy Awards throughout its run. Bochco was fired from MTM in 1985 following the failure ofBay City Blues (1983).[citation needed]
Bochco moved to20th Century Fox where he co-created and producedL.A. Law (1986–94) which aired on NBC. This series was also widely acclaimed and a regular award winner. In 1987, Bochco co-created the half-hourdramedyHooperman which starredJohn Ritter but was canceled after two seasons, despite Bochco offering to take over direct day-to-day control of a third season.Hooperman was part of a lucrative deal withABC in 1987 to create and produce ten new television series, which prompted Bochco to form Steven Bochco Productions.[a] That year, Bochco was in final talks with an exclusive agreement withCBS or ABC, and ABC reportedly being the winning bid.[5] From this deal cameDoogie Howser, M.D. (1989–93) andCop Rock (1990). The latter combined straight police drama with live-action Broadway singing and dancing, and was one of his highest-profile failures. In 1992, Bochco created an animated television series,Capitol Critters, along with Nat Mauldin and Michael Wagner.
After a lull, Bochco co-createdNYPD Blue (1993–2005) withDavid Milch. Initially controversial at the time, the series was created with the express intention of changing the nature of network one-hour drama to compete with the more adult fare broadcast on cable networks. The spring 1994 television schedule on ABC presented the only run of a television series executive produced by Bochco,The Byrds of Paradise. The series showcased a plot structure that was an early forerunner in presenting a more realistic, and not idealized, representation of character development in theprime time television format, but it aired for only one season, and has yet to be re-aired on television.[6][7] AlthoughThe Byrds of Paradise achieved significant critical acclaim during its initial run, and helped launch the careers of actorsSeth Green andJennifer Love Hewitt, the show has never received an official release on anyhome video format orstreaming media platform.[8][9][10] Other projects in this period that failed to take off includeMurder One (1995–97),Brooklyn South (1997),City of Angels (2000),Philly (2001), andOver There (2005). All five shows failed to match Bochco's earlier success thoughMurder One andOver There garnered critical praise. In 1995, he had a contract withCBS to air the network's future programs, and had to distribute the shows worldwide.[11] In 1999, he moved toParamount Television where he remained until 2005.[12] Shortly afterwards, he was moved to ABC's corporate subsidiaryTouchstone Television later in 2005.[13]
In 2005, Bochco took charge ofCommander in Chief (2005–06), created byRod Lurie, and brought in a new writing team. However, in spring 2006, he left the show because of conflicts with ABC, and shortly afterward the program was canceled. Bochco described his experience on the show as "horrible".[14] In 2006 Bochco produced a pilot for an ABC show,Hollis & Rae,[15] and was reported at the same time to be developing a baseball drama and another legal drama for ABC in partnership withChris Gerolmo.[citation needed]
It was announced in March 2007 that Bochco had taken his first steps into internet TV with the 44-episodeCafe Confidential, each episode being 60-seconds of unscripted "confessions" by members of the public.[16] Yet another legal drama titledRaising the Bar was produced forTNT, this time in partnership withDavid Feige, although it was cancelled in December 2009 during the second season.[17][18]
According to an interview with Bochco published in September 2007, he was winding down his involvement with network television, feeling that his tastes and current fashions in TV drama no longer coincide.[14] "The network executives stay the same age and I keep getting older and it creates a different kind of relationship. When I was doing my stuff at NBC with Brandon [Tartikoff] andHill Street, we were contemporaries," says Bochco.[19] "When I sit down [now], they're sitting in a room with someone who's old enough to be their father and I'm not sure they want to sit in a room with their fathers."[19]
In 2008, Bochco argued that the new home for quality prime time drama is cable, where "the atmosphere is far friendlier and the creative environment more conducive to doing original work", and that "most of what's passing for primetime drama these days isn't very good".[20]
Prior toHill Street Blues it was rare for American straight drama series to havestory arcs, i.e. several stories running over many episodes (with the exception of prime time soap operas such asDallas). It was also rare to have a large regular cast. The structure of the modern "ensemble" television drama can be traced to Bochco, who many regard as having changed the "language" of television drama.[21]
From 2014 to its cancellation in 2016, he wrote and executive producedMurder in the First, a series drama which he co-created withEric Lodal.[22]
Bochco was married three times: to Gabrielle Levin from 1964 to their divorce in 1969, to actressBarbara Bosson from 1970 to their divorce in 1997, and to television producer and executive Dayna Kalins from 2000 until his death.[23] Bochco had three children.[2] His son,Jesse Bochco, with Bosson, is a producer/director who directed several episodes of his father's shows, includingNYPD Blue,Philly, andOver There. As a child, son Jesse played the son of his real mother's character on one episode ofHill Street Blues.
At the time of his death, Bochco lived in thePacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles.[24]
Bochco was diagnosed withleukemia in 2014, requiring a bone marrow transplant later that year.[25] He died from the disease at his home on April 1, 2018, at age 74.[24]
| Pre–Steven Bochco Productions | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Title | Genre | First air date | Last air date | No. of seasons | Network |
| The Bold Ones: The New Doctors | Medical drama | September 14, 1969 (1969-09-14) | May 4, 1973 (1973-05-04) | 4 | NBC |
| Richie Brockelman, Private Eye | Drama | March 17, 1978 (1978-03-17) | April 14, 1978 (1978-04-14) | 1 | |
| Paris | Drama | September 29, 1979 (1979-09-29) | January 15, 1980 (1980-01-15) | 1 | CBS |
| Hill Street Blues | Drama | January 15, 1981 (1981-01-15) | May 12, 1987 (1987-05-12) | 7 | NBC |
| Bay City Blues | Comedy-drama | October 25, 1983 (1983-10-25) | July 8, 1984 (1984-07-08) | 1 | |
| L.A. Law | Legal drama | September 15, 1986 (1986-09-15) | May 19, 1994 (1994-05-19) | 8 | |
| Hooperman | Comedy-drama | September 23, 1987 (1987-09-23) | July 19, 1989 (1989-07-19) | 2 | ABC |
| Steven Bochco Productions | |||||
| Title | Genre | First air date | Last air date | No. of seasons | Network |
| Doogie Howser, M.D. | Sitcom | September 19, 1989 (1989-09-19) | March 24, 1993 (1993-03-24) | 4 | ABC |
| Cop Rock | Drama | September 26, 1990 (1990-09-26) | December 26, 1990 (1990-12-26) | 1 | |
| Capitol Critters | Animated | January 28, 1992 (1992-01-28) | March 14, 1992 (1992-03-14) | ||
| NYPD Blue | Drama | September 21, 1993 (1993-09-21) | March 1, 2005 (2005-03-01) | 12 | |
| The Byrds of Paradise | March 3, 1994 (1994-03-03) | June 23, 1994 (1994-06-23) | 1 | ||
| Murder One | September 19, 1995 (1995-09-19) | May 29, 1997 (1997-05-29) | 2 | ||
| Public Morals | Sitcom | October 30, 1996 (1996-10-30) | October 30, 1996 (1996-10-30) | 1 | CBS |
| Total Security | Drama | September 27, 1997 (1997-09-27) | November 8, 1997 (1997-11-08) | 1 | ABC |
| Brooklyn South | September 22, 1997 (1997-09-22) | April 28, 1998 (1998-04-28) | 1 | CBS | |
| City of Angels | January 16, 2000 (2000-01-16) | December 21, 2000 (2000-12-21) | 2 | ||
| Philly | September 25, 2001 (2001-09-25) | May 28, 2002 (2002-05-28) | 1 | ABC | |
| Blind Justice | March 8, 2005 (2005-03-08) | June 21, 2005 (2005-06-21) | |||
| Over There | July 27, 2005 (2005-07-27) | October 26, 2005 (2005-10-26) | FX | ||
| Raising the Bar | September 1, 2008 (2008-09-01) | December 24, 2009 (2009-12-24) | 2 | TNT | |
| Murder in the First | June 9, 2014 (2014-06-09) | September 4, 2016 (2016-09-04) | 3 | ||
