Yvette Lee Bowser facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Yvette Lee Bowser
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|---|---|
| Born |
Yvette Denise Lee
June 9, 1965 |
| Education | Stanford University (BA) |
| Occupation | Television producer, screenwriter |
| Years active | 1987–present |
| Known for | A Different World Living Single Half & Half Black-ish Dear White People Run the World |
| Spouse(s) |
Kyle Bowser
(m. 1994) |
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
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1991–1992 | A Different World | Producer, Program Consultant | 25 episodes |
| 1993 | Hangin' with Mr. Cooper | Producer | 17 episodes |
| 1993 | The Wayans Bros. | Executive Consultant | 17 episodes |
| 1993–1998 | Living Single | Creator, Executive Producer | 105 episodes |
| 1996 | Lush Life | Creator, Executive Producer | 7 episodes |
| 1998–2002 | For Your Love | Creator, Executive Producer | 84 episodes |
| 2002–2006 | Half & Half | Executive Producer | 91 episodes |
| 2008–2009 | Lipstick Jungle | Consulting Producer | 11 episodes |
| 2012 | The Exes | Consulting Producer | 12 episodes |
| 2012–2013 | Happily Divorced | Consulting Producer | 12 episodes |
| 2014–2016 | Black-ish | Consulting Producer | 3 episodes |
| 2017–2019 | Dear White People | Executive Producer | 30 episodes |
| 2018—present | Bluey | Co-Writer | 154 episodes |
| 2021 | Run the World | Executive Producer | 8 episodes |
