Introduction

This introduction provides a brief overview of the playwright in American television. As the cultural positioning of TV has changed, so too has the role of the dramatist within both the theater and the television industry. The writers interviewed have television credits that include The Americans, Boardwalk Empire, GLOW, Masters of Sex, Insecure, Shameless, and The West Wing. The conversations engage issues including the economics of playwriting; training and graduate education; representations of class, race, and gender on TV; changing media formats; and institutional structures for new dramatic writing.