Women Behind the Scenes Spotlight: Lesli Linka Glatter

Today’s Women Behind the Scenes spotlight is shone on TV director and producer Lesli Linka Glatter.

Before getting into directing, Lesli was a modern dance choreographer who worked throughout Europe, Asia and the United States and transitioned into film choreography for the 1985 box office release To Live and Die in L.A.

That same year, through the American Film Institute’s Directing Workshop for Women, she co-directed a short film called Tales of Meeting and Parting that was nominated for an Academy Award in the Live Action Short Film category.

Starting in 1986, she began directing for TV, working on the series Amazing Stories as well as the TV movies Into the Homeland and Vietnam War Story II. Throughout the 1990’s, she directed on TV shows like Brewster Place, Twin Peaks, NYPD Blue, Murder One and Brooklyn South.

At the turn of the new century, she directed episodes of TV shows including Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, ER, Gilmore Girls, Freaks and Geeks, Citizen Baines (for which she also served as a producer), Third Watch, The West Wing, Grey’s Anatomy, Numb3rs, The O.C., The Closer, House, Mad Men, Heroes, Heartland, The Starter Wife, Swingtown, The Mentalist, Weeds, The Unit And Lie to Me.

Over the last few years, Lesli has directed episodes of The Good Wife, Pretty Little Liars, True Blood, The Playboy Club (for which she also served as co-executive producer), The Chicago Code (where she also served as co-executive producer), Boss, Nashville, Last Resort, The Newsroom, Homeland (where she is also a co-executive producer), The Walking Dead, Justified, Ray Donovan and Masters of Sex.

Her directing has not been limited to television as she made her film directorial debut on Now and Then and she also directed several episodes of the online WIGS series Lauren.

Lesli was nominated for a Director’s Guild award for the episodes of Twin Peaks and Homeland for which she directed and she was also nominated for an Emmy award for directing Mad Men as well as winning the Directors Guild Award for Mad Men.

She is currently in development on numerous film and TV projects through her production company called Whatever Lola Wants Production and she serves on the American Film Institute’s Education and Training Board, the Western Director’s Council of the Director’s Guild of America and is a Board Member of the Director’s Guild of America.

Lesli lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Clayton Campbell who is an artist and their son Nick. Lesli can be followed on Twitter at @LeslilinkaG.