Advertising Wolf worked as an
advertising copywriter at
Benton & Bowles creating
commercials for
Crest toothpaste, including the slogan "You can't beat Crest for fighting cavities." He is also credited with the campaign "I'm Cheryl, fly me" for
National Airlines. Despite his success in copywriting, he was writing
screenplays in the hopes of a film career. It was at this time that he briefly collaborated on a screenplay with
Oliver Stone, who was a struggling
screenwriter at the time.
Initial screenwriting success He moved to
Los Angeles after a few years and had three screenplays produced; one of these films,
Masquerade (1988), featuring
Rob Lowe and
Meg Tilly, gained notable acclaim. He started his television career as a staff writer on
Hill Street Blues and was nominated for his first
Emmy Award for the episode "What Are Friends For?", on which he was the only writer. While working on
Hill Street Blues, Wolf became close friends with
Tom Fontana, then writing for the series
St. Elsewhere, produced in the same building, at the same time. Wolf moved from
Hill Street Blues to
Miami Vice, where he was a writer and co-producer for the third and fourth seasons.
Law & Order franchise Wolf's original series
Law & Order ran from 1990 to 2010, and was revived in 2022. It has surpassed
Gunsmoke as longest-running dramatic show in American television history, making it one of television's most successful franchises. It has been nominated for the most consecutive
Emmy Awards of any primetime drama series. Wolf serves as creator and executive producer of the current
Law & Order drama series from
Wolf Entertainment and
NBCUniversal Television –
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (which, , is the longest-running scripted primetime drama, having aired 551 episodes, breaking the original
Law & Order count of 456 (now 501 through the twenty-third season), and beating both the original
Law & Order and
Gunsmoke in number of seasons). Wolf also was creator and executive producer for five spinoff shows in the franchise –
Law & Order: Criminal Intent,
Law & Order: Trial by Jury,
Law & Order: LA,
Law & Order: Organized Crime, and
Conviction. Many of Wolf's series have intersected with the
Law & Order franchise in some fashion, and the
Law & Order series have been adapted into several foreign versions. He was also the creator and executive producer of NBC's courtroom reality series
Crime & Punishment, which chronicled real-life cases prosecuted by the
San Diego District Attorney's office.
Chicago franchise Wolf developed
Chicago Fire, a drama about a group of men and women working at the
Chicago Fire Department. The series was picked up by NBC in May 2012, and premiered on October 10, 2012, with meek numbers in the ratings and minimal reviews in the first few weeks before spiking to NBC's #2 scripted drama series, under
Revolution. In March 2013, NBC announced intentions for a spin-off of
Chicago Fire revolving around the Chicago Police Department. When that series
Chicago P.D. premiered,
Derek Haas,
Michael W. Brandt, and
Matt Olmstead became executive producers, under Wolf. Two subsequent shows,
Chicago Med which premiered in 2015, and
Chicago Justice whose one season began and ended in 2017, followed in ''Chicago P.D.'s'' wake.
FBI franchise In 2018, Wolf became executive producer of the
CBS drama
FBI, starring
Law & Order cast members
Jeremy Sisto and
Alana de la Garza and also
Sela Ward.
FBI has since had two spinoffs (
FBI: Most Wanted, and
FBI: International), giving Wolf his third franchise. Beginning in the
2021–2022 TV season, all three of Wolf's franchises have their own night of programming:
FBI Tuesdays on CBS (original series,
Most Wanted,
International),
Chicago Wednesdays on NBC (
Med,
Fire,
P.D.), and
Law & Order Thursdays on NBC (original series revival,
SVU and
Organized Crime).
Other work In 2012, Wolf developed the unscripted show
Cold Justice, a documentary drama, for
TNT. He also has written three novels whose central character is NYPD Detective Jeremy Fisk:
The Intercept,
The Execution, and
The Ultimatum. In 2024, Wolf released a documentary miniseries with Netflix called
Homicide: New York. In May 2021, NBC ordered a docuseries
LA Fire and Rescue. The series followed the firefighters of the
Los Angeles County Fire Department and was executive produced by Wolf. The series was cancelled by NBC after one season.
Art collecting In December 2023, the
Metropolitan Museum of Art announced the promised gift of over 200 works of art from Wolf, including Old Master paintings, sculptures and drawings, as well as funds to endow two galleries with his name. Wolf reported that his appreciation for art started when he was a child visiting Met on his way home from school. ==Honors==