1997–2007: Early work and The Sopranos Weiner described the start of his career as a "dark time. Show business looked so impenetrable that I eventually stopped writing." During this time, his wife financially supported them with her work as an architect. He began his screenwriting career writing for the short-lived
Fox sitcom Party Girl (1996). and
Andy Richter Controls the Universe. Weiner served as a supervising producer for the fifth season of
The Sopranos (2004), a co-executive producer for the first part of the sixth season (2006), and an executive producer for the second part of the sixth season (2007). He has sole or joint credit for 12 episodes overall, including the
Primetime Emmy Award-nominated episodes "
Unidentified Black Males" (co-written with
Terence Winter) and "
Kennedy and Heidi" (co-written with David Chase). He received two Primetime Emmy Awards as a producer of
The Sopranos — one for the show's fifth season in 2004 and one for the second part of the show's sixth season in 2007. In addition to writing and producing, he acted in two episodes, "
Two Tonys" and "
Stage 5" as fictional mafia expert Manny Safier, author of
The Wise Guide to Wise Guys, on TV news broadcasts within the show. Weiner also spent the hiatus between the two seasons teaching at his alma mater, the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television (now School of Cinematic Arts), where he taught an undergraduate screenwriting class on Feature Rewriting during the Fall 2004 semester.
2007–2015: Mad Men and acclaim During his time on
The Sopranos Weiner began looking for a network to produce
Mad Men. HBO,
Showtime and FX passed on the project. HBO offered to produce the series if Chase would be on board as a writer or producer, but Chase instead chose to focus on developing feature films. and in 2010, for "
Shut the Door. Have a Seat." (shared with
Erin Levy). In 2009, he was also nominated for "A Night to Remember" (with Veith), "Six Month Leave" (with
Andre Jacquemetton &
Maria Jacquemetton), and "The Jet Set"; he was also nominated in 2010 for "
Guy Walks into an Advertising Agency" (with Veith). In 2011, he was nominated for "
The Suitcase". In 2012, he was nominated for "
Far Away Places" and "
The Other Woman", both with
Semi Chellas. Most recently, in 2015, he was nominated for "Lost Horizon" with Chellas and "Person to Person". Weiner and his writing staff also won a
Writers Guild of America Award for Best New Series and were nominated for the award Best Dramatic Series at the
February 2008 ceremony for their work on the first season. They were nominated for the WGA award for Best Dramatic Series a second time at the
February 2009 ceremony for their work on the second season. Weiner and the writing staff won the WGA Award for Best Drama Series (after being nominated for the third consecutive year) at the
February 2010 ceremony for their work on the third season. Weiner was also twice nominated for the WGA award for episodic drama at the February 2010 ceremony for his work on "The Grown-Ups" (with co-writer
Brett Johnson) and "
Guy Walks into an Advertising Agency" (with
Robin Veith). Weiner's first feature film,
Are You Here, filmed in
North Carolina, premiered at the
2013 Toronto International Film Festival and was released in 2014.
2016–present Weiner's first novel,
Heather, the Totality, was published in the fall of 2017. In 2018, Weiner created
The Romanoffs, an
Amazon Video anthology series. In May 2025, the world premier of Weiner's play,
John Wilkes Booth: One Night Only, took place at
Baltimore Center Stage. Both Weiner and
Booth were originally from the
Baltimore,
Maryland area. The premiere was about a mile from
Green Mount Cemetery where Booth is buried.
Prospective projects In 2020, it was announced that Weiner was developing a half-hour
dramedy at
FX which he would write, direct and executive produce as his next TV project. While no plot details were disclosed, sources said at the time that the show would also contain elements of
mystery. However, by 2022, the project was no longer moving forward at FX. In 2025, Weiner was reportedly hired by
New Regency to adapt the 1989
Nicole Kidman film
Dead Calm into a TV series. == Personal life ==