Neil Landau is an American screenwriter, playwright, producer, and director. His film and television credits include the teen comedy Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead, Melrose Place, The Magnificent Seven, Doogie Howser, M.D., The Secret World of Alex Mack and MTV's Undressed. Neil has also worked internationally as both co-head-writer and executive script consultant on television and film projects for Sony Pictures Television International, Freemantle Media, and Intereconomia.
Career
He has developed numerous one-hour drama TV pilots for several studios and networks including Warner Bros., Touchstone, CBS, ABC Family, and Lifetime, and has written movies for Universal Pictures, Disney, Columbia Pictures, and 20th Century Fox. He rewrote Tad, The Lost Explorer, an animated feature based on the popular “Tadeo Jones” comic books for El Toro and Paramount. He would then help write the sequel. He also worked as executive script consultant on the El Toro-produced film Lope, which was short-listed for an Academy Award as Best Foreign Film. He acted as executive script consultant for the El Toro/Universal Pictures film "Bruc, the Manhunt" in 2010. Neil recently served as Executive Vice-President of Scripted Development for Amedia Film Group located in Moscow, working with writers, creative producers, story editors, and studio executives, guiding a slate of original projects including feature films, animation, miniseries, made-for-television movies, one-hour drama series, situation comedies, soap operas, and historical docudramas.
Teaching
Neil teaches in the MFA in Screenwriting and Producing Programs at both UCLA School of Film & Television and USC School of Cinematic Arts. He is also a faculty advisor in the MFA in Writing Program at Goddard College. He has authored several books on film and television. His first book, 101 Things I Learned in Film School, was published in May 2010. He is also a contributor to the anthology WriteNow! Screenwriting ; published in September 2010. He then wrote The Screenwriter's Roadmap in 2012, followed by The TV Showrunner’s Roadmap in 2014. This was followed by TV Outside the Box in 2016, and TV Writing On Demand: Creating Great Content in the Digital Era in 2018.
