David Steven Cohen to Receive WGAE Jablow Award Award

NEW YORK CITY –  David Steven Cohen will receive the Writers Guild of America, East’s (WGAE) Richard B. Jablow award for devoted service to the Guild. The award is named for Richard B. Jablow, who helped found the WGAE, authored its constitution, and served as its first counsel. Former WGAE President Chris Albers and WGAE Foundation President Tom Fontana, who received the award jointly in 2009, will present the Jablow award to David Steven Cohen at the 62nd annual Writers Guild Awards ceremony held on Saturday, February 20, 2010 at New York City ’s Hudson Theatre.

David Steven Cohen, an award-winning television writer/producer and screenwriter, has been an active member of the WGAE for many years. He is serving his second term on the WGAE Council and is a member of the Animation Caucus. Cohen has served on many Guild committees, including chairing the Awards Committee from 2004 through 2009, during which time he was also head writer and executive producer of the awards ceremony. His efforts reach current and future writers, having started an interview series with screenwriters as a joint venture of the WGAE and New York University and teaching comedy writing in conjunction with the Guild and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. For the WGAE Foundation, Cohen is on the committee for the Michael Collyer Memorial Fellowship in Screenwriting, which he helped to create.

“It has been my privilege to know David Steven Cohen for more than a decade. His hard work and enthusiasm, patience and skill as both a member of the Guild East Council and past chairman of the awards committee are deeply appreciated and appropriately recognized and honored with this year’s Jablow Award," said Michael Winship, president of the Writers Guild of America, East.

In a career that spans live action to animation to opera, Cohen began writing with Steve Martin’s 40 Share Productions, then worked on series including Pee-wee’s Playhouse, Parker Lewis Can’t Lose, ALF, Living Single and Cartoon Network’s cult classic, Courage the Cowardly Dog, for which he was head writer. As executive producer of Nickelodeon’s The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss, he won a Writers Guild Award and received two Emmy nominations, and recently earned a Writers Guild Award nomination for his work on the Disney Channel’s Phil of the Future.  Cohen is a frequent contributor to the PBS series Arthur and co-wrote the animated feature Balto, produced by Steven Spielberg.

Also a composer and lyricist, Cohen wrote the libretto for the opera Lilith, which was performed by New York City Opera at Lincoln Center . He has contributed songs to many TV shows, films and recordings and was a featured lyricist at the Lincoln Center American Songbook Series. Most recently, he co-wrote the title track for Something Beautiful, a collection of contemporary standards also featuring songs by Van Morrison, James Taylor and Paul McCartney.

The Richard B. Jablow Award was established in 1978 to recognize devoted service to the Guild.  Past recipients include: Catherine Twohill, Gail Lee, Warren Leight, James Schamus, Ruth Gallo, Stephen Schiff, Richard Wesley, Michael Winship, Herb Sargent, Edward Adler, Marc Siegel, Claire Labine, Jerome Coopersmith, Ernest Kinoy, Loring Mandel, and Ellen Violett. 

The 62^nd annual Writers Guild Awards will take place on Saturday, February 20, 2010 in New York City at the Hudson Theatre in the Millennium Broadway Hotel and simultaneously in Los Angeles at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel. For more information or to purchase tickets to the New York City awards ceremony, call 212-767-7812 or visit the WGAE website at www.wgaeast.org/awards. 

The Writers Guild of America, East, AFL-CIO, is a labor union representing writers in motion pictures, television, cable, digital media, and broadcast news. The WGAE conducts programs, seminars, and events on issues of interest to, and on behalf of, writers. In addition, it represents writers’ interests on the legislative level.  For more information on the Writers Guild of America, East, visit www.wgaeast.org.