LINDA WOOLVERTON

While working as a development executive at CBS, Linda Woolverton wrote two young adult novels:  Star Wind and Running Before the Wind. After her books were published by Houghton Mifflin, she abandoned development and began to write full time. She started by writing scripts for animated television shows.

When one of her novels caught the attention of a Disney executive, she was hired to write the script for the animated feature, "Beauty and the Beast". Upon its release in 1991, the film won the Golden Globe for the Best Comedy/Musical and became the first animated film to be nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award. 

Woolverton was then hired to write the screenplay for "The Lion King" (shared credit). She then re-wrote the script for "Homeward Bound:  The Incredible Journey" (shared credit) as well as writing for the animated feature "Mulan".

She went on to adapt the script of Beauty and the Beast for the Broadway stage and received the Tony Award nomination for Best Book of a Musical in 1994. Woolverton was also awarded the Laurence Oliver Award for Beauty and the Beast for Best New Musical in the U.K.  Beauty and the Beast ran between 1994 and 2007, becoming the sixth longest running show in Broadway history. Woolverton also wrote the Book (shared) for Elton John and Tim Rice's Musical Aida which ran for five years at the Palace Theatre. 

In November 2009,  the Writers Guild of America, West’s Animation Writers Caucus named Linda Woolverton as the honoree of its eleventh annual Animation Writing Award for lifetime achievement, recognizing her creative contributions to advance the craft of film and television animation writing.

Linda Woolverton's screenplay for "Alice in Wonderland" is a sequel to the original works by Lewis Carroll.  Directed by Tim Burton, it is currently in production and scheduled for release in 2010.