Tom Fontana
Born (1951-09-12) September 12, 1951
Buffalo, New York, United States
Alma materBuffalo State College
Occupation(s)Screenwriter, playwright, producer
Spouses
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(m. 1982; div. 1993)​
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    (m. 2015; died 2016)​
    Children1

    Tom Fontana (born September 12, 1951) is an American screenwriter, writer, and television producer. Fontana worked on NBC's Homicide: Life on the Street and created HBO's Oz.[1]

    Early life and education

    Fontana was born on the west side of Buffalo, New York, and is the fourth of five children in an Italian-American family;[2] he is a cousin of actress Patti LuPone. He attended Cathedral School, Canisius High School, and Buffalo State College. He worked at the Studio Arena Theater in Buffalo in various capacities before moving to New York City in 1973. Fontana struggled with substance abuse for much of his early adulthood.[3]

    Career

    Television

    Having started out as a playwright, Fontana was hired by Bruce Paltrow as a writer for St. Elsewhere. Fontana has been a writer/producer for such series as Oz (which he also created), Copper, The Jury, The Beat, The Bedford Diaries, Homicide: Life on the Street (which he also co-created with James Yoshimura, according to staff writer Eric Overmyer), and The Philanthropist.

    Fontana wrote the HBO film Strip Search, directed by Sidney Lumet, and contributed two pieces to the September 11 special, America: A Tribute to Heroes. He was the executive producer of American Tragedy for CBS, Shot in the Heart for HBO Films, the independent film Jean, and the documentary The Press Secretary for PBS. Fontana also created the historical drama TV series Borgia for the French premium-pay channel Canal+, produced by Atlantique Productions and EOS Entertainment. The series recounts the Borgia family's rise to power and subsequent domination of the Vatican during the Renaissance. Fontana also co-created Copper, an 1860s police procedural set in the turbulent Five Points neighborhood of New York.

    Fontana has received three Emmy Awards, four Peabody Awards, three Writers' Guild Awards, four Television Critics Association Awards, the Cable Ace Award, the Humanitas Prize, an Edgar Award, and the first prize at the Cinéma Tout Ecran Festival in Switzerland. In 2003, Fontana was the recipient of the Austin Film Festival's Outstanding Television Writer Award.

    Articles

    Fontana has written articles for such periodicals as The New York Times, TV Guide, and Esquire, and has taught at Columbia, Syracuse, Rutgers, and the State University College at Buffalo, his alma mater, from which he received the Distinguished Alumni Award and an honorary Doctorate of Letters.

    Plays

    Fontana has had numerous plays produced in New York City, where he lives, and at San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater, the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, the Buffalo Studio Arena Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival, and McCarter Theatre Company.

    Personal life

    Fontana's sister is a nun. He lives in New York City's West Village in a building that was formerly a branch of the New York Public Library. The book-lined, two-story main reading room is now a living room where he often hosts fund raisers for arts and civil-rights organizations.

    Fontana was married to actress Sagan Lewis for 12 years until their divorce in 1993.[1] Sagan and Fontana remarried on July 10, 2015, and remained together until her death on August 7, 2016.[1][4]

    Fontana has a tattoo of the Oz logo on his upper right arm, which he is shown receiving in the opening credits of the series.[5]

    Fontana does not own or use a computer, and writes all of his scripts longhand on a yellow legal pad.[6]

    Membership

    He is a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Producers Guild of America, and the Writers Guild of America, East, from which he received the Evelyn F. Burkey Award for lifetime achievement. Fontana served as vice president of the Writers Guild of America, East from 2005 to 2007. He is president emeritus of the WGAE Foundation, commonly known as the Writers Guild Initiative, and serves on the boards of the Acting Company, the Williamstown Theatre Festival, DEAL, the New York City Police Museum, and Stockings With Care, among others.

    Detective Joe Fontana, Dennis Farina's character on Law & Order, was named for Tom Fontana, who became close friends with Law & Order creator Dick Wolf while working as writers in the same building, at the same time, on the series St. Elsewhere (Fontana) and Hill Street Blues (Wolf).[7]

    Filmography

    Film

    Year Title Credited as Notes
    Writer Producer
    1985The Fourth Wise ManYesNo
    1993New YearYesNo
    1996The ProsecutorsYesNo
    1997FirehouseYesYes
    2000Homicide: The MovieYesNo
    2004JudasYesNo
    2004Strip SearchYesNo

    Television

    Year[8] Title Network Credited as Notes
    Creator Writer Producer
    1982-1988 St. Elsewhere NBC No Yes Yes
    1988-1999 Tattingers NBC Yes Yes Yes Co-created with Bruce Paltrow and John Masius
    1992 Home Fires NBC Yes Yes Yes Co-created alongside Bruce Paltrow and John Tinker
    1993-1999 Homicide: Life on the Street NBC No Yes Yes
    1997-2003 Oz HBO Yes Yes Yes
    2000 The Beat UPN Yes Yes Yes
    2004 The Jury Fox Yes Yes Yes Co-created alongside Barry Levinson and James Yoshimura
    2009 The Philanthropist NBC Yes Yes Yes Co-created alongside Charlie Corbin and Jim Juronen
    2012-2013 Copper BBC America Yes Yes Yes Co-created with Will Rokos
    2011-2014 Borgia Canal+ Yes Yes Yes
    2019-2022 City on a Hill Showtime No No Yes Also showrunner
    2024- Monsieur Spade[9] AMC & Canal+ Yes Yes Yes Also showrunner with Scott Frank

    References

    1. 1 2 3 Petski, Denise (August 6, 2016). "Sagan Lewis Dies: Actress & Wife Of Emmy-Winner Tom Fontana Was 63". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved August 16, 2016.
    2. ↑ Doyle, Paula (April 5, 2004). "'What if Judas almost got it?'". The Tidings. Archived from the original on May 2, 2005. Retrieved October 7, 2010.
    3. ↑ "Episode 80: The Twelve Days of Crime Story – Day 8: Tom Fontana, Homicide and Oz". December 30, 2019.
    4. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/tom.fontana.1238?fref=ts
    5. ↑ "Twelve Astonishing Facts about "Oz," HBO's Original Crime Drama". Paley Matters. October 13, 2017. Retrieved March 29, 2022.
    6. ↑ "Email".
    7. ↑ "Dick Wolf Interview". Archive of American Television. Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation. April 21, 2013. Retrieved May 10, 2016.
    8. ↑ Each U.S. network television season starts in late September and ends in late May, which coincides with the completion of May sweeps.
    9. ↑ "AMC/AMC+ GIVE FIRST-LOOK AT CLIVE OWEN IN MONSIEUR SPADE, LIMITED SERIES DEBUTS EARLY 2024". September 8, 2023. Retrieved January 13, 2024.
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