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Yvette Denise Lee Bowser (born 1965) is an American television writer and producer best known for creating the Fox sitcom Living Single. Early in her career, worked on The Cosby Show spin-off A Different World. With Living Single, she became the first African-American woman to develop her own primetime series.

Career

Bowser started on A Different World in 1987 as one of a number of apprentices, rising in prominence in the production company over the years and eventually becoming producer by the 1991–92 season. She left the show to take a position with Hangin' with Mr. Cooper.

Bowser created her own company, Sister Lee Productions, which produced or co-produced her later shows, Living Single and Half & Half. She has said in an interview that she draws many of her characters and plots from her own and her friends' personal experiences. She has said, "I just basically rip pages out of my diary to tell stories on TV." In the case of Half & Half, for example, the writer based the characters Mona and Dee-Dee on herself and an older half-sister, and plot ideas came from her experience as the youngest child in a blended family.

Through Sister Lee Productions, Bowser served as showrunner for the critically acclaimed Netflix series Dear White People, adapted with Justin Simien from his film of the same name. In 2020, she became the showrunner on the Starz original series Run the World, created by Leigh Davenport.

Personal life

Yvette Denise Lee was born in Philadelphia in 1965. She lived in the city's Carroll Park neighborhood until age 5, when she and her mother moved to California. Bowser graduated from Santa Monica High School in 1983. She attended with Holly Robinson, who was a part of the Hangin' with Mr. Cooper cast and later starred in For Your Love. She also attended with her friend Lori Petty, whom she later cast in her sitcom Lush Life.

After high school, Lee attended Stanford University where, in spring 1986, she pledged the Xi Beta chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.

Yvette Lee married producer Kyle Bowser in 1994. The two worked together on Living Single, Half & Half, and For Your Love.

Filmography

References

1. Kranz, Rachel (2004). African-American Business Leaders and Entrepreneurs. Infobase Publishing. p. 23. ISBN 9781438107790. Retrieved 25 March 2020.
2. Gregory, Deborah. ""Yvette Lee Bowser: the sister who took 'Living Single' straight to the top! - African American television producer". Essence. December 1994.
3. Brown, Malaika. (April–May 1995). "Sisterhood televised: Yvette Lee Bowser and the voices she listens to - creator and executive producer of the TV show, 'Living Single'". American Visions.
4. Perkins, Ken Parish (March 29, 1998). "Yvette Lee Bowser's 'For Your Love' Breaks Sitcom Color Barriers". Fort Worth News-Telegram. The Des Moines Register (Des Moines, Iowa).
5. ^ Walker, Nicole (March 15, 2004). "Two sisters, two different moms—TV's 'half & half' takes a fresh look at the blended black family". Jet. Archived from the original on January 23, 2005.
6. Young, Danielle (27 April 2017). "From A Different World to Dear White People: Meet the Black-TV-Series Whisperer, Yvette Lee Bowser". theroot.com. The Root. Retrieved 16 January 2019.
7. "Dear White People (2017)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved May 22, 2018.
8. "Dear White People: Season 1 reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved May 3, 2017.
9. "Dear White People Season 2". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved June 30, 2018.
10. "Dear White People: Season 2 reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved June 3, 2018.
11. Low, Elaine (30 January 2020). "Starz Gives Series Order to Yvette Lee Bowser Comedy 'Run the World'". variety.com. Variety. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
12. Venable, Malcolm (14 June 2021). "Why Yvette Lee Bowser Wanted to Make 'Run the World'". msn.com. MSN. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
13. Yvette Lee Bowser Interview Part 1 of 4 - TelevisionAcademy.com/Interviews. Television Academy Interviews. August 8, 2023. Event occurs at 0:30. Retrieved November 4, 2024. I was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at the University of Pennsylvania, in 1965.
14. Shea, Kathleen (October 15, 1993). "A Single-minded Passion for Success". Philadelphia Daily News. p. 83.
15. ^ Pennington, Gail (July 22, 1996). "Fox Makes Plans for 'Super' Season". St. Louis Post-Dispatch. p. 6E.
16. Bobbin, Jay (March 15, 1998). "Couples Live 'For Your Love'". The Palm Beach Post (West Palm Beach, Florida).
17. "Xi Beta Legacy". Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated, Xi Beta Chapter. 2016. Archived from the original on July 3, 2105.
18. Holmes, Kristin E.The Bible's fresh voice, Philadelphia Inquirer, Nov. 4, 2006

External links

• Yvette Lee Bowser at IMDb
• Yvette Lee Bowser at The Interviews: An Oral History of Television

• Television producers from California
• American women television producers
• American women television writers
• African-American screenwriters
• American television writers
• 1965 births
• Living people
• American women screenwriters
• Writers from Philadelphia
• People from Santa Monica, California
• Stanford University alumni
• 20th-century American screenwriters
• 20th-century American women writers
• 21st-century American screenwriters
• 21st-century American women writers
• African-American women screenwriters