David Mirkin (born September 18, 1955 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is an American feature film and television director, writer and producer. He is a native of Philadelphia and an alumnus of Loyola Marymount University. He has won several Emmys along with the prestigious Peabody Award.
His first job writing for television was on the American version Three's Company. Mirkin walked away from the experience with a brand new cat, taken from one of the episodes. He named the cat T.C., short for "Televised Cat" and Three's Company.
Mirkin was the executive script supervisor and writer for the popular television show Newhart from 1982 to 1990. In the early 1990s, Mirkin created an unusual television series with comedian Chris Elliott, entitled Get a Life, which he also usually wrote and directed. That show only lasted a couple of seasons, but has a loyal following of fans to this day.
He also wrote an unsuccessful pilot with Julie Brown and Charlie Coffey entitled The Julie Show, starring co-creator Brown. It was not picked up for the fall season. The trio also collaborated on the short-lived FOX Network sketch comedy show The Edge from 1992 to 1993.
Mirkin was the executive producer/showrunner for the popular animated series, The Simpsons during its fifth and sixth seasons (1993 – 1995). He wrote the episode Deep Space Homer, in which Homer and Barney are recruited by NASA. Many of his episodes (10) are written by John Swartzwelder, for whom he expresses much admiration on the DVD commentaries. Mirkin also states on the Simpsons DVDs that his favorite movie is The Graduate and that he was very happy to get Anne Bancroft to provide a guest voice for the episode Fear of Flying.
To this day Mirkin works part time for the show, helping with the re-write process. He also was the executive producer for two episodes in the ninth season of The Simpsons ("The Joy of Sect" and "All Singing, All Dancing") He was also one of 11 writers who worked on The Simpsons Movie.
In a 2008 episode of The Simpsons ("That 90's Show), David Mirkin is listed as the director of the music video "Margerine", in which Homer sings of his love for his then-estranged girlfriend, Marge.
From 1992 to 1998, Mirkin was one of several directors for the HBO series, The Larry Sanders Show.
Mirkin also directed two successful feature films Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997) starring Lisa Kudrow and Mira Sorvino and Heartbreakers (2001) starring Sigourney Weaver, Gene Hackman and Jennifer Love Hewitt He also directed the James Taylor video "Enough to be on Your Way".
Was a ham radio operator. His former callsign, WA3QIZ, is also used by Simpsons character Seymour Skinner.
