About

Michael MacLennan has been nominated seven times for the Writers Guild of Canada Screenwriting Award. In 2018 he was honoured as the recipient of the WGC’s Showrunner of the Year Award.  He has served as a producer on close to 300 TV episodes.

A graduate of the Canadian Film Centre, Michael began his screenwriting career as Writer and Story Editor for CBC'S hit series Wind At My Back, subsequently recruited as showrunner for PBS’s Anne of Green Gables series before helming the BBC/TV series Super Rupert.  During that time his feature film script The Ice Men was produced.

Michael then served as Co-Executive Producer on Showtime's top-rated series Queer As Folk, writing 14 episodes over four seasons, the most of any writer. He subsequently created and show-ran City TV's award-winning flagship series Godiva's. American pilots have included The Healer and Four Corners for CBS, The Box and Afterwives (with bestselling author Jennifer Weiner) for ABC. With Douglas Coupland, he co-created and produced the CBC series jPod. Other scripts include The Guard and Being Erica, on which he served as Consulting Producer. He was also Consulting Producer of the CBS/CTV hit series Flashpoint, and served as Co-Executive Producer on SyFy's series Bitten.

Michael created and show-ran the hit series Bomb Girls, which was twice nominated for best series Canadian Screen Award, and honoured as Outstanding Dramatic Series by the US Gracie Awards. He was Co-Executive Producer on Freeform's hit series The Fosters, then served as Showrunner of Britbox's first original series The Bletchley Circle: San Francisco, a co-production with ITV, CityTV, and Netflix.

Michael recently created the Netflix series Tiny Pretty Things, which was the number-one series worldwide for fourteen days.

His work as a teacher includes Adjunct Professor and Orion Lecturer at University of Victoria, Adjunct Professor at University of British Columbia, Executive-Producer-in-Residence at Canadian Film Centre, and Showrunner-In-Residence at Vancouver's Pacific Screenwriting Program.  Guest lecturing includes Davidson College, Kansas State, and Dalhousie University. He's in demand as a mentor and supervising showrunner for a diverse array of emerging writers with projects in development including at Paramount+, Wattpad, and Incendo. 

Michael began his writing career as a playwright, with plays performed across North America and Europe. His first play Beat The Sunset garnered Vancouver's Jessie Richardson Award for outstanding new play and the Theatrum National Playwriting Award. Grace won the Theatre BC National Playwriting Competition. The Shooting Stage and Last Romantics both won the Voaden Prize and were Governor General's Award nominees. His play Life After God, an adaptation of Douglas Coupland’s work, was followed by his sixth published play, The Good Egg.  As a librettist, he has collaborated with composer Jeffrey Ryan to create various operas, including The Laurels and Mother/Land.

Born in Vancouver, he divides his time between Toronto, Los Angeles and Vancouver.