Diane English
Diane English on the set ofThe Women
Born	(1948-05-18)May 18, 1948 (age 77) Buffalo, New York, U.S.
Alma mater	Buffalo State College
Occupations	Director screenwriter producer
Spouse	Joel Shukovsky ​ (m. 1977⁠–⁠2010)​

Diane English (born May 18, 1948) is an American screenwriter, producer and director.^[1] She is best known for creating the television showMurphy Brown which won multiple awards, including 18 Primetime Emmy Awards from 62 nominations.^[2][3][4][5] She also wrote and directed the 2008 feature filmThe Women. She has won numerous awards, including 3 Emmy Awards, and received numerous nominations.^[6][7][8]

English was born inBuffalo, New York, the daughter of Anne English and Richard English who was an electrical engineer.^[9] She graduated fromNardin Academy in Buffalo, and then fromBuffalo State College in 1970.

English began her career atWNET, the PBS affiliate in New York City, working first as a story editor forThe Theatre in America series, and then as associate director ofTV Lab. From 1977 to 1980, she wrote a monthly column on television forVogue magazine.

In 1980, she co-wrote PBS'The Lathe of Heaven, an adaptation ofUrsula K. Le Guin'sscience fiction novel of the same name, and received her first Writers Guild Award Nomination. She followed that with the television moviesHer Life as a Man (1984) andClassified Love (1986).

In 1985, English createdFoley Square, her first half-hour comedy series, which aired on CBS during the 1985-1986 television season. It starredMargaret Colin,Hector Elizondo,Michael Lembeck andJon Lovitz. The show premiered on December 11, 1985, and languished near the bottom of the Nielsen ratings in the weeks that followed. After being put on hiatus after only 11 episodes, CBS rescheduled it to another night and aired the three remaining episodes of the season. With ratings low, CBS cancelled the show after only 14 episodes with the last episode airing on April 8, 1986. During 1986 and 1987, English executive produced and wrote the CBS comedy seriesMy Sister Sam, starringPam Dawber which lasted for two seasons with 12 episodes that never aired before being cancelled.

In 1988, she created the CBS television seriesMurphy Brown, for which she won threeEmmy Awards (one for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series and two for Outstanding Comedy Series).^{[10][11][12][13]} The series ran from 1988 to 1998 for a total of 247 episodes. It garnered 18 Emmy wins from 62 nominations.^[5] In 1992, English stirred up controversy when the title character decided to have a child out of wedlock. Vice presidentDan Quayle gave a speech entitled "Reflections on Urban America to the Commonwealth Club of California" on the subject of the Los Angeles riots. In this speech, Quayle blamed the violence on a decay of moral values and family structure in American society. In an aside, he cited the title character in the television program Murphy Brown as an example of how popular culture contributes to this "poverty of values", saying, "It doesn't help matters when prime time TV has Murphy Brown – a character who supposedly epitomizes today's intelligent, highly paid, professional woman – mocking the importance of fathers, by bearing a child alone, and calling it just another 'lifestyle choice'.^[14]

English responded with a statement that read: "If the vice president thinks it's disgraceful for an unmarried woman to bear children (out of wedlock), and if he believes that a woman cannot adequately raise a child without a father, then he'd better make sure abortion remains safe and legal." In 2002, Candice Bergen, the actress who played Brown, said "I never have really said much about the whole episode, which was endless, but his speech was a perfectly intelligent speech about fathers not being dispensable and nobody agreed with that more than I did." This controversy along with the shifting times of that decade touched off a debate over the meaning of "family values" of Americans during that election year in whichBill Clinton andAl Gore ran againstGeorge H. W. Bush and Dan Quayle.^{[citation needed]}

During the success ofMurphy Brown, her company, withJoel Shukovsky, Shukovsky English Entertainment, had set up a deal withCBS for a non-exclusive deal, giving them exclusive syndicated rights to future Shukovsky/English series, in 1991.^[15]

English also created the comedy seriesLove & War (1992–1995), starringSusan Dey andJay Thomas -Annie Potts replaced Dey after the first season. Other series she co-created and/or executive produced includeDouble Rush (1995),Ink (1996), andThe Louie Show, starringLouie Anderson (1996), andLiving in Captivity (1998). Unfortunately, none of the series were picked up for more than a single season withThe Louie Show lasting six episodes. As forInk, she took over the role fromJeffrey Lane, who initially came up with the concept of the series.^[16]

In 2008, English wrote, produced and directedThe Women, her feature film debut. The comedy, a remake of the 1939George Cukor film of the same name, starsMeg Ryan,Annette Bening,Eva Mendes,Debra Messing, andJada Pinkett Smith. It was released to mostly negative reviews but its box office tripled its budget when worldwide markets were factored in.^[17]That same year English and the ensemble cast ofThe Women were honored with theWomen in FilmCrystal award^[18] which honors women in communications and media.

• Diane English atIMDb
• Diane English atThe Interviews: An Oral History of Television

• 1948 births
• Living people
• Screenwriters from New York (state)
• American women television producers
• American television writers
• American women film directors
• Buffalo State University alumni
• Film directors from New York (state)
• Writers from Buffalo, New York
• Primetime Emmy Award winners
• American showrunners
• Television producers from New York (state)
• American women screenwriters
• American women television writers
• Writers Guild of America Award winners
• 20th-century American screenwriters
• 20th-century American women writers
• 21st-century American screenwriters
• 21st-century American women writers

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles with hCards
• All articles with unsourced statements
• Articles with unsourced statements from June 2016
• The Interviews name ID same as Wikidata