Taffy Brodesser-Akner | |
|---|---|
| Born | Stephanie Akner 1975 or 1976 (age 49–50)[1] New York City, U.S. |
| Alma mater | New York University |
| Occupation | Journalist |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 2 |
| Website | www |
Taffy Brodesser-Akner (bornStephanie Akner) is an American journalist and author. She has worked freelance and as a contributor toGQ andThe New York Times, where she is now a staff writer. Her profiles of celebrities have won her theNew York Press Club Award andMirror Award. She is the author ofLong Island Compromise andFleishman Is in Trouble. The latter was made into a seven-timeEmmy-nominatedminiseries, which she also wrote.
Brodesser-Akner's first major journalism job was atSoap Opera Weekly, a job she held until it was eliminated due to layoffs in 2001.[2] She also wrote forMediabistro[3] and did freelance pieces for magazines includingESPN The Magazine,GQ, andTexas Monthly. TheColumbia Journalism Review called her "one of the nation's most successful freelance writers".[4] Many of her freelance articles were celebrity profiles, several of which went viral.[5] In 2014, she became a contributing writer to bothThe New York Times andGQ,[3] and won aNew York Press Club Award for entertainment news in a magazine for her story about actressGaby Hoffmann.[6] She won two New York Press Club awards in 2015, for her profiles ofDamon Lindelof andBritney Spears.[7] The same year, Brodesser-Akner was nominated for aMirror Award for her profile ofJoey Soloway,[8] and in 2016 she won the award for her profile of broadcasterDon Lemon.[9] In 2017, she became a full-time staff writer atThe New York Times.[5]
Her first novel,Fleishman Is in Trouble, was published in 2019 by Random House in the US[10][11] and by Wildfire in the UK.[12] The novel was longlisted for theWomen's Prize for Fiction 2020.[13] Brodesser-Akneradapted the novel as a TV miniseries, which debuted onHulu on November 17, 2022.[14] In 2023, she was nominated for aPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie. Her second novel,Long Island Compromise, was published in 2024 by Random House in the US[15] and by Wildfire in the UK.[16]
Born Stephanie Akner, Brodesser-Akner received the nickname "Taffy" at a young age and continued using it professionally.[17] She grew up inBrooklyn, New York,[1] in anOrthodox Jewish household.[18] She attendedNew York University.
She married Claude Brodesser in 2006.[1] Brodesser converted to Judaism,[1] a process that eventually led Akner to evaluate and reinforce her own observance of Jewish customs.[19] After marrying, both took hyphenated last names.[17] They have two children.[20] She wrote that as a "3G" grandchild of Holocaust survivors, she was particularly alarmed when her son was called an antisemitic slur on the basketball court inRiverside Park, and her other son had a caricature done inTimes Square that evoked antisemitic tropes.[21]