Name Katy Garretson Website www.katygarretson.com | Years active 1988-present Occupation Television director Role Television Director | |
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Full Name Kathleen Garretson Spouse Jonathan Axelrod (m. 2010) Education University of Southern California Awards DGA Frank Capra Achievement Award Nominations Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Comedy Series Similar People David Lee, Peter Casey, David Angell, Illeana Douglas | ||
Other names Kathleen E. Garretson | ||
2012 DGA Awards - Katy Garretson, Frank Capra Achievement Award Winner
Kathleen "Katy" Garretson (born May 15, 1963 in Nuremberg, Germany) is an American television director and producer, known for directing the sitcoms Fraiser, 2 Broke Girls, Fuller House and others as well as producing on the Garage Sale Mystery movies. She received the Frank Capra Achievement Award from the Directors Guild of America (DGA) in 2012 and had other nominations from the DGA for her work.
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Early life
Kathleen Garretson was born in Germany while her father was serving in the U.S. Air Force stationed there and she was raised in a U.S. military family. Garretson is a graduate of the University of Southern California, earning degrees in both Journalism and Business Communications. At USC, Garretson was a member of the Delta Delta Delta Sorority, and was an award-winning member of the USC Speech & Debate Team. She became interested in the film industry while working at her college job as a tour guide at Universal Studios.
Career
Following graduation, and a brief run as a production assistant and stand-in, Garretson was accepted into the Directors Guild of America (DGA) training program. Following a two-year trainee period, she then fully joined the DGA as an assistant director. During her first few years as a DGA member, Garretson worked mainly on made-for-TV films and feature films. Her credits include Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Clifford, Switch and The Specialist.
She continued to work as an assistant director on MOW's, features and commercials for several years, eventually moving onto the sitcom Frasier. Garretson made her directorial debut during the show's sixth season. She was nominated for a Directors Guild of America Award for "Best Comedy Director of 1999" for her first directing assignment. She continued to direct episodes of Frasier until the show's end in 2004. Her other directing credits include Fuller House, 2 Broke Girls, The Odd Couple, One Big Happy, Young & Hungry, Sullivan & Son, Titus, Reba, Girlfriends, George Lopez, Freddie, One on One, True Jackson, VP and the animated series Sid the Science Kid.
In January, 2012, Garretson received the Frank Capra Achievement Award from the DGA. She was the 26th recipient of this annual award, presented to a Guild member with at least twenty years of distinguished DGA credits and fifteen years of quality Guild service. Garretson served as an Associate National Board member and Council Chair at the DGA, and on numerous guild committees.
Garretson took a two-year hiatus from directing from early-2012 to mid-2014 to serve as the Executive Director of a non-profit, the "I Have a Dream" Foundation - Los Angeles (IHADLA). She had been a mentor and volunteer with the organization for many years, and was asked to oversee a rebuilding and revitalization of the foundation. This was accomplished by 2014, and Garretson returned to her creative roots in film and television production.
Garretson is also a television producer, and in 2011-12, found, developed and was supervising producer on a TV movie, Garage Sale Mystery, for The Hallmark Channel. This movie, which aired in September 2013, broke nearly every ratings record for The Hallmark Channel, and in March 2014, Hallmark announced it would re-brand its movie channel to be The Hallmark Movie & Mystery Channel, and would have a “wheel” of mystery movies led by new Garage Sale Mysteries (GSM). Seven GSM movies have aired and four new ones scheduled to air in August 2017.
Garretson has long been active in the DGA and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (ATAS), speaking on numerous panels and seminars. She has also taught classes on sitcom directing at the American Film Institute in Los Angeles.