”Wicked” Scribe Winnie Holzman Attributes Her Success To Mentors, Drive, Luck, & Not Working with Jay

The amazing writer Winnie Holzman talks with Jay about hard word and being lucky, Wicked the Musical, Stephen Schwartz, My So Called Life, laying in bed depressed about writing, fighting your fear, tricks of staying in the creative process, Marianne Williamson, studying Broadways musicals even when she didn’t know she wanted to, being driven towards showbiz at 13, taking the train to acting classes, mentors: Arthur Laurents, Stephen Sondheim, loving acting, being married to the great actor, Paul Dooley, how her daughter Savannah is a great writing partner, and Jay’s feud with Ted Danson.

Bio: Winnie Holzman is the writer (with renowned composer/ lyricist Stephen Schwartz) of the musical Wicked, which is now the 4th longest running show in Broadway history, and has been performed in over a hundred cities around the world. After graduating from Princeton University, she studied acting, joined a comedy group, got accepted into the newly formed NYU Musical Theatre Program, (where she studied with such luminaries as Arthur Laurents, Leonard Bernstein, and Stephen Sondheim) wrote a musical (Birds of Paradise, which had a short run off-Broadway) then joined the writing staff of the TV drama thirtysomething, and went on to create the series My SoCalled Life, starring Claire Danes. Other TV credits include Once and Again, (reuniting with her mentors, Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz) Huge (with her daughter, Savannah Dooley) and Roadies (with Cameron Crowe.) She’s written two plays with her husband, actor Paul Dooley: Post-its: Notes on a Marriage, and Assisted Living. Most recently, she completed both screenplays for the movie adaptations of Wicked