Rick Cleveland

(MFA 1995) Co-produced and written for the television series West Wing and Six Feet Under. His play Jerry and Tom, first produced at Iowa then made into a feature film, premiered at Sundance and recently appeared on Showtime.

He served as executive producer on the critically acclaimed HBO original series Six Feet Under from 2001–2005 which ran for 5 seasons.

Cleveland won the Jury Award for Best One Person Show at the 2006 US Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Colorado for his performance in "My Buddy Bill", about his friendship with President Bill Clinton, a monologue play filmed on June 15, 2007 for a Comedy Central Special and DVD.

In 2000, Cleveland and The West Wing creator, Aaron Sorkin won an Emmy and Writers Guild Award for their episode "In Excelsis Deo" an episode which originally aired during the 1999–2000 season.

Cleveland, Brian Koppelman, David Levien, Matthew Chapman all co-wrote the 2003 film Runaway Jury based on the book by John Grisham. In 2005, Cleveland linked a 2 year deal with NBC Universal Television in which he will produce and develop drama projects for the network. Also, he is writing a "Frankenstein" movie for Will Ferrell.

Cleveland, a graduate of the Playwrights Workshop at the University of Iowa, is also a founding member of Chicago's American theater company.

Alumni |Playwrights Workshop
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