American screenwriter and director Alan Ball was BOTD in 1957. Born in Marietta, Georgia, he studied theatre at Florida State University and began his professional career as a playwright. During the 1990s, he worked as a staff writer for television sitcoms Grace Under Fire and Cybill. His first film script American Beauty, a black comedy about male existential despair and homophobia in American suburbia, was filmed by Sam Mendes in 1999, starring Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening. An international commercial and critical success, the film won the Oscar for Best Picture, with awards for Ball’s screenplay, Spacey and Mendes. Ball’s next project, Six Feet Under, a surrealist drama about a family of undertakers in suburban California, became one of the highly acclaimed shows of the 2000s, notable for its foregrounding of queer characters and themes. He followed this with True Blood, an enjoyably sex-and-blood drenched vampire drama, wittily exploring themes of homophobia, AIDS panic and giving the world the gift of a shirtless Alexander Skarsgård. His other projects as writer-director, the 2007 film Towelhead and 2020’s Uncle Frank, were box office flops, and his 2018 TV drama Here and Now was cancelled after its first season. He also co-produced the TV series Banshee and a TV film adaptation of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks starring Oprah Winfrey. Ball is married to Six Feet Under actor Peter Macdissi, and is a vocal advocate for gay rights.