Gary Jacobs

Gary Jacobs was born in New York, grew up in Dallas, and was educated at the University of Texas at Austin, where he received a Bachelor degree in Journalism.

Immediately upon graduation, he moved to New York to pursue comedy writing. Jacobs’ first job was at The Children’s Television Workshop (producers of “Sesame Street”), where he became an editor of The Electric Company Magazine, a companion piece to the television series. A couple of years later, he landed his first television job, writing for “The Dick Cavett Show.”

The following year, Jacobs moved to Los Angeles, where he began adding to his resume, writing for both variety shows and situation comedies. His big break came when he was hired on the staff of the acclaimed “Newhart.”

A few years later, Jacobs became Executive Producer (Head Writer) of a new series called “Empty Nest,” which went on to become a long-running hit for NBC. “Empty Nest” was never out of the Top Ten rated shows during Jacobs’ three seasons as Executive Producer.

Jacobs followed up “Empty Nest” by creating and executive producing two series of his own. The first, “Woops!,” was a zany, Monty Pythonesque show about a group of survivors of a nuclear war, one of the first sitcoms to air on the then new Fox network, and picked as one of the best new series by TV Guide and The Washington Post. The second series was “All-American Girl,” a much written and talked about show starring Margaret Cho, the first sitcom ever to focus on an Asian-American family.

After having written for countless shows and executive producing nearly 100 episodes of primetime programming, Jacobs and his wife and two young children relocated to Jacobs’ beloved Austin, Texas. There, he has published a novel (STILL LIFE WITH GENITALS), two anthologies of short pieces (OUT OF MY MIND: A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS, SHORT STORIES, AND OTHER SILLY THINGS and MAYBE IT'S JUST ME), and a children’s book (THE CURIOUS ANT). He also found time to earn two Masters degrees, one in Education from Texas State University and the other in Creative Writing from Goddard College.

Most recently, Jacobs has been writing humorous op-eds and essays for the Los Angeles Times, the New Jersey Star-Ledger, and the Huffington Post.

(A more extensive list of Gary Jacobs’ television credits can be found at http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0414412/.)