In his household growing up in Rye, New York, “the television was always on,” says producer-writer-director Greg Berlanti, who received the Television Academy’s 2024 Governors Award. And he never got stuck on just one genre. “It really went all over the map,” he says. “From Happy Days to The Six Million Dollar Man to Dynasty to Family Ties, I watched it all religiously.”
There was one thing those shows had in common, and it has shown up in all of his work — from his first TV writing gig in 1999 on Dawson’s Creek to his work as executive producer on current series like NBC’s Brilliant Minds and The CW’s All American. “Whether it’s a work family, a found family or a biological family, the people who are in our lives change us and challenge us,” says the Northwestern grad. “Ultimately, it’s all about those personal connections.”
These days, Berlanti’s TV work isn’t slowing down, with several new shows on the horizon, including Stillwater at Prime Video (the first non–DC Comics graphic novel he’s adapted), the apocalyptic Afterlife with Archie at Disney+ and a new Max family drama with the working title How to Survive Without Me. Berlanti is excited about these adaptations and also another new element: “All of these I’m doing with new writing partners that I haven’t [worked] with before, which has also been fun,” he says.
Here are some of Berlanti’s past projects that have really resonated with fans.
Dawson's Creek
Dawson’s Creek (1998–2003)
Berlanti rose through the ranks to showrunner on this WB teen drama and brought television its first passionate same-sex kiss, featuring gay teen Jack McPhee (Kerr Smith) in 2000, though it wasn’t easy. “We had instructions from Standards and Practices that the kiss had to happen in a wide shot,” he recalls. Unable to be on set the day the groundbreaking moment was shot, he remembers, “I was yelling through the phone to make sure they got the closeup. ‘Don’t listen to anybody,’ I said. ‘I need a close-up!’” (The close-up is what aired.)
Everwood (2002–06) / Jack & Bobby (2004–05)
Running these two primetime dramas at the same time on The WB was a first for Berlanti, and he learned a valuable lesson. “For me, it was sort of what the characters on the shows very often learn, which is, you don’t have to do it alone,” he says. “Most people who I respect and admire greatly have always written and conceived these things with a team.”
Brothers & Sisters (2006–11)
Having left Warner Bros. for ABC Studios, Berlanti ran this family drama starring Sally Field and Calista Flockhart. “With that cast, you couldn’t go to a table read without being a little nervous,” he says. Times had also changed for gay characters like Kevin (Matthew Rhys) and boyfriend-turned husband Scotty (Luke Macfarlane). Berlanti, not wanting another battle, initially pulled back on the couple’s intimacy, but “[network] executives read one script and were like, ‘Wait, why aren’t they kissing?’ Times had changed.”
The CW’s DC Universe (2012–24)
Berlanti says growing up loving comics was “social kryptonite” but, returning to Warner Brothers, he struck gold with a string of DC Comics–based shows, starting with Arrow and followed by The Flash, Supergirl, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow, Black Lightning, Batwoman and Superman & Lois. Besides being chuffed by the massive crossover events, he’s proud to show these series to his children: “My son [Caleb, 8] is watching The Flash, which is fun for me, because I don’t think there’s a show I’ve worked on that I’ve gone back and rewatched.”
Riverdale
Riverdale (2017–23)
“A lot of people thought the show wasn’t going to work,” Berlanti recalls, but after this live-action mystery based on Archie Comics aired its first season on the CW, it reaired on Netflix over the summer, and it took off. “Getting the tone right was to everyone’s credit, from the cast to [creator-EP-showrunner] Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa to [EP] Jon Goldwater — and the network, for sticking with it.”
You (2018–25)
How does one make a series about poetry-loving stalker-murderer Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) work? “We had the Caroline Kepnes novel, which was so well-rendered. For [cocreator–EP] Sera Gamble and myself, it really was such a touchstone,” Berlanti says. The show began on Lifetime but moved to Netflix starting with season two. “We really felt like the story had something to say about romance in the tech era and how everyone’s either a voyeur or an exhibitionist.”
All American
By the 2019–20 TV season, Berlanti had his name on 18 television series, including this CW football drama run by Nkechi Okoro Carroll. The show will wrap in 2026 after eight seasons. While Carroll was the creative lead and showrunner on this series, Berlanti's involvement behind the scenes with all his series never wavered: "My feeling is, if your name is at the beginning or end of the show, you’re responsible for it, so you end up breaking a lot of stories and doing a pass through scripts, and I don’t think it’s appropriate to take credit."
This article originally appeared in emmy Magazine, issue # 13, 2025, under the title "Greg Berlanti."
