Women Behind the Scenes Spotlight: Mimi Leder

Mimi Leder

Today’s Women Behind the Scenes spotlight is shone on Executive Producer and Director Mimi Leder.

Mimi was born in New York City and became the first female graduate of the AFI Conservatory in 1973. During the latter part of the 1970’s she was involved in a number of independent projects, working as a camera operator, unit photographer, assistant director and script supervisor.

In the early 1980’s she worked as a script supervisor for a number of made-for-TV movies and then landed a job with the now-legendary TV series Hill Street Blues. A few years later, after working on a few more made-for-TV movies, she worked as a script supervisor on L.A. Law and a year later became a director on the show. In the latter part of the 1980’s she worked as a director on the TV shows A Year in the Life, Midnight Caller and Crime Story. From 1988 to 1991, Mimi worked her way up from a production consultant to a producer and director on the critically acclaimed TV series China Beach. Because of her work on China Beach, she was nominated for several Emmy awards.

For the next few years, Mimi work primarily as a director, working on more made-for-TV movies and then she landed on ER as a supervising producer and a director, which led to her earning Emmy awards in 1995 and 1996. She eventually became a co-executive producer on the long-running medical drama.

She then directed the box office films The Peacemaker and Deep Impact in the latter part of the 1990’s and the film Pay It Forward in 2000.

At the turn of the century she worked as an executive producer and director on the TV shows The Beast, John Doe and Jonny Zero. Over the next five years, she worked as a director on The West Wing, Related and Thick as Thieves. She also worked as a director and executive producer on the short-lived TV series Vanished and the made-for-TV movie U.S. Attorney.

In 2009, Mimi returned to direct an episode of the final season of ER and has recently directed episodes of Human Target and Shameless. She also directed an episode of the upcoming new series Luck, which will debut on HBO this January.