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Full articleLowell Ganz (born August 31, 1948) is an American screenwriter, television writer, and producer best known for his long-term creative partnership with Babaloo Mandel, through which they co-wrote several acclaimed comedy films of the 1980s and 1990s, including Splash (1984) and City Slickers (1991).
Ganz began his career in television in the early 1970s as a staff writer on the sitcom The Odd Couple, eventually rising to head writer. He later served as a supervising producer on Happy Days from 1974 to 1984 and co-created the spin-off series Laverne & Shirley, which aired from 1976 to 1983. These early television successes established Ganz as a key figure in 1970s sitcom writing before he transitioned to feature films.
In 1982, Ganz teamed up with Mandel for their first joint film project, Night Shift, marking the start of a prolific collaboration that produced multiple box-office hits. Their breakthrough came with Splash, a romantic fantasy comedy directed by Ron Howard that starred Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah, earning them an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay in 1985. Subsequent collaborations included Parenthood (1989), a family dramedy; City Slickers (1991), a Western comedy starring Billy Crystal; and A League of Their Own (1992), a sports film featuring Tom Hanks and Geena Davis. The duo's work often blended humor with heartfelt themes, contributing to their reputation as one of Hollywood's most successful screenwriting teams, and in 2019, they received the Writers Guild of America Laurel Award for Screen Writing Achievement. Ganz has also produced animated features like Robots (2005) and continued writing into the 2000s.
In brief
Lowell Ganz (born August 31, 1948) is an American writer and producer. He is the long-time writing partner of Babaloo Mandel and has written for television, film, and theatre. Ganz grew up in a Jewish family in Queens, New York, attending Martin Van Buren High School in Queens Village.
He dropped out of college and moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue a career writing for sitcoms, starting with The Odd Couple. From there, he moved on to writing for the TV series Happy Days and created two of its spin-off series, Laverne & Shirley and Joanie Loves Chachi. In 1982, Ganz and Mandel teamed up with Happy Days actors Ron Howard and Henry Winkler to make their first film, the low-budget comedy Night Shift, which was also actor Michael Keaton's first film; Howard signed on because he wanted to start directing while Winkler wanted to move away from his image as the Fonz.
