Ted Mann, Writer and Producer on ‘NYPD Blue,’ ‘Deadwood’ and ‘Homeland,’ Dies at 72

Ted Mann, Writer and Producer on ‘NYPD Blue,’ ‘Deadwood’ and ‘Homeland,’ Dies at 72

Ted Mann, the writer and Emmy-winning producer who teamed with David Milch on NYPD Blue, Deadwood, John From Cincinnati and three other TV series, has died. He was 72.

Mann died Thursday at St. John’s Health Center in Santa Monica after a battle with lung cancer, his daughter Lucy Bujold told The Hollywood Reporter.

Mann also was a producer and writer on the fifth, sixth and seventh seasons (2015-18) of Showtime’s Homeland.

The Vancouver native co-wrote the screenplays for the big-screen comedies O.C. and Stiggs (1985), directed by Robert Altman and based on stories Mann wrote for National Lampoon magazine, and Space Truckers (1996), directed by Stuart Gordon.

On ABC’s NYPD Blue, Mann had producing credits on 42 episodes during the show’s first two seasons (1993-95) and 18 writing credits on seasons one, two, five and six; wrote and produced on HBO’s Deadwood from 2004-06 during its three seasons; and wrote and produced on HBO’s John From Cincinnati during its lone season in 2007.

Mann received his Emmy (shared with Milch, Steven Bochco and others) in 1995 for outstanding drama series and landed other noms in the premiere category for Deadwood in 2005 and Homeland in 2016.

Mann and Milch had written for the 1991-93 ABC legal drama Civil Wars, for the 1997-98 CBS cop show Brooklyn South and for the 1997 ABC crime drama Total Security. (Like NYPD Blue, Bochco was involved with all three of those shows as a producer and/or creator.)

Born on Oct. 24, 1952, Mann worked for a magazine in Canada before becoming a writer and editor at National Lampoon. He segued into TV by writing for two 1979 projects that came from the magazine: the HBO telefilm Disco Beaver From Outer Space and the ABC comedy Delta House, a spinoff of Animal House.

His writing and/or producing credits also included Miami Vice, Millennium, Total Recall 2070, Skin, Judging Amy, Crash, Hatfields & McCoys and Magic City.

In addition to his daughter, survivors include his second wife, Bly (they were partners for 42 years and married in 1988); another daughter, Elizabeth; a son, James; siblings Bayne and Tish; and grandchildren Virginia, Graham and Magnus.