Spouse Betsy Borns | ||
Nominations Edgar Award for Best Television Episode Teleplay Similar David E Kelley, Britain Dalton, Lukas Reiter, Nina Arianda, Tania Raymonde Profiles | ||
Jonathan Shapiro is a writer, producer, attorney and former Assistant U.S. Attorney as well as Of Counsel at Kirkland & Ellis. He is the co-creator and Executive Producer, with David E. Kelley, of Amazon Prime's TV show Goliath starring Billy Bob Thornton. Shapiro has written fiction, for example a book entitled Deadly Force: A Lizzie Scott Novel (ABA Publishing 2014) as well as non-fiction, e.g. another book named Lawyers, Liars, and the Art of Storytelling (Ankerwycke 2015). Shapiro has also written episodes of TV shows such as The Blacklist, Boston Legal, The Practice and Life and is also a frequent collaborator of fellow attorney-writer-producer David E. Kelley.
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Early life and background
Shapiro received an undergraduate degree and graduate degree at Harvard University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar at Oriel College at Oxford University, and his Juris Doctor (J.D.), or law degree, at the University of California Berkeley School of Law. Shapiro is Jewish.
Legal career
While attending Berkeley Law's Boalt Hall, Shapiro worked as a staff writer for The Recorder from 1987-1990, then upon graduation, became a Trial Attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice (two years from 1990-1992) in Washington, D.C., and following that position, served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the United States Attorneys Office at the United States District Court for the Central District of California for six years from 1992-1998. He then entered private practice, working briefly at O'Melveny & Myers in 1998 before returning to the public sector as Chief of Staff for Lt. Governor Cruz Bustamante from 1999-2000. For the next 13 years from 2000-2013, Shapiro wrote and produced episodes for TV shows such as The Blacklist, Life, Boston Legal, The Practice, Justice, Just Legal and others. From 2013-2015, Shapiro was Of Counsel at Kirkland & Ellis LLP.
Shapiro was also the former chairman and member of the California Commission on Government Economy and Efficiency, and previously held the position of director and founder of the Public Counsel Emergency for Torture Victims. In 2010, Shapiro was appointed to serve the State of California Little Hoover Commission for a four year term.
Shapiro also was an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Southern California School of Law, where he taught Federal Criminal Law.
TV/Film career and writing
Starting from 2001, Shapiro wrote episodes and served as a Story Editor on The Practice, writing at least 16 episodes of the show. In 2005-2006, he wrote at least three episodes of Just Legal, at least 6 episodes of Justice in 2006, at least 7 episodes of Boston Legal from 2004-2008, at least 4 episodes of Life from 2007-2009, at least 3 episodes of The Paul Reiser Show in 2011, at least 4 episodes of The Firm in 2012, at least 2 episodes of The Blacklist from 2014-2015 and at least 8 episodes in 2016 of Goliath, which he created with David E. Kelley.
Shapiro also served as a Supervising Producer and/or Producer on The Practice from 2002-2004 on at least 31 episodes, a Supervising Producer on Boston Legal from 2004-2008 on at least 18 episodes, an Executive Producer on Just Legal from 2005-2006 on at least 8 episodes, an Executive Producer on Justice from 2006-2007 on at least 13 episodes, a Co-Executive Producer on Life from 2007-2009 on at least 31 episodes, an Executive Producer on The Paul Reiser Show in 2011, a Consulting Producer on The Firm in 2012 on at least 20 episodes and an Executive Producer on at least 8 episodes in 2016 of Goliath.
In 2014 at the National Capital Chesapeake Bay Chapter's Emmy Awards held in Washington, D.C., Shaprio won an Emmy Award for the short film/PSA Fair and Free, which he conceived, wrote and produced and which also featured former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. The short film was part of the National Association of Women Judges Informed Voters Project, which encourages women of all backgrounds to exercise their right to vote and make a difference in the electoral process. Shapiro also received a separate Emmy nomination for his script.
Shapiro has also received a Peabody Award for his writing work on Boston Legal and several Humanitas Awards for his writing and/or producing on Boston Legal (for the episode "Roe v. Wade: The Musical" (2008)) and The Practice (for the episodes "Honor Code" (2002) and "Final Judgment" (2006)), and was further nominated for an Edgar Allen Poe Award for his writing on The Practice episode "Killing Time" (1997).
Books
In 2014, Shapiro published his non-fiction book Lawyers, Liars, and the Art of Storytelling (ABA Publishing). In 2015, Shapiro published his fiction book Deadly Force: A Lizzie Scott Novel (Ankerwycke), revolving Lizzie Scott, an Assistant U.S. Attorney at the US Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.