Women Behind the Scenes: Tawnia McKiernan

Tawnia McKiernan

Today’s Women Behind the Scenes spotlight is shone on Director Tawnia McKiernan, who is the daughter of the late (great) Stephen J. Cannell, the creator of TV shows like Hardcastle and McCormick, The A-Team and The Greatest American Hero [among many others].

Tawnia has amassed an impressive list of directorial credits since the mid-1990s, but she got her start in the industry as an Assistant Production Coordinator on the made-for-TV movie Beastmaster: The Eye of Braxus. She got her start in the director’s chair on the TV series Renegade and then moved on to direct several episodes of Silk Stalkings.

At the turn of the century she added more TV shows to credit, including being the director of episodes of the syndicated series V.I.P., the hit series Hunter, the short-lived series 10-8: Officers on Duty and Jonny Zero and the blockbuster series NYPD Blue.

In the middle of that directorial work, she acted as First Assistant Director on a 2002 horror film called Dead Above Ground that was written by her father.

Starting in 2004 and over the course of the next five years, she took to the director’s chair for episodes of The Closer, Bones and Las Vegas, Close to Home, ER, Army Wives, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Monk as well as the short-lived series Windfall, Eyes and Women’s Murder Club.

Over the last few years, she has been the director on episodes of Royal Pains, Psych, Warehouse 13, In Plain Sight and Burn Notice.

She is also a co-chair member of the Directors Guild of America.