Andy Cowan

Andy Cowan (born Andrew Glenn Cowan) is an American writer and script consultant for television and other media and a podcast host. He is the creator and host of the comedy/therapy podcast, The Neurotic Vaccine, launched in 2022, winner of the 2025 Quill (podcasting) Award for Best Comedy Podcast. In 2026 it was rebranded as The Neurotic Vaccine: Comedy with a Point and selected as a finalist for Podcast of the Year and Best Comedy. The Neurotic Vaccine wound up landing among the top comedy interview podcasts in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Italy, Greece, Denmark, Ireland, New Zealand, and Romania, and in 2023 was a multiple final Quill Podcast Award nominee for Best New Podcast and Best Comedy Podcast. From 2010–2011, he co-hosted his radio comedy therapy talk show, Up & Down Guys, on KPFK 90.7 FM in Los Angeles. In 2019 an Up & Down Guys podcast pilot was produced for Westwood One.

He has appeared on several television shows, hosted the hour-long talk show pilot, Another Talk Show! with Andy Cowan, featuring Jason Alexander and Sheila Raye Charles, and was guest commentator on KTTV's Good Day L.A. He has written humor columns for the Los Angeles Times newspaper and magazine, Salon, special material for The New Yorker, and several songs, one of which won international song contest nods. He is a voiceover artist, and performs as lead vocalist and hand percussionist in jazz venues throughout Los Angeles.

Biography Cowan received a master's degree in broadcasting from Boston University and began his broadcasting career in radio and TV news in Pennsylvania. Featured in the November 2018 edition of American University Magazine, it was there he received his bachelor of arts degree in psychology.

Career After gaining media experience in Pennsylvania radio and TV stations and performing standup comedy, Cowan moved to Los Angeles, writing scripts for several comedy television shows. He gained greater exposure with The Merv Griffin Show during the 1980s, where he wrote, assisted in producing segments, and was a recurring performer. He pre-interviewed hundreds of political, literary and entertainment figures, including Jerry Seinfeld and Orson Welles eight times up to his final TV appearance, deemed one of TV Guide magazine's 60 greatest talk show moments. For the cable TV channel Showtime, he produced, wrote and hosted the 1990 short 6 Minutes, a spoof of the popular 60 Minutes. That segment won a CableACE Award in 1991.

In 1996 Variety named him one of "50 Creatives to Watch." At the 2009 Southeast New England Film, Music & Arts Festival, Cowan received the Best Comedy Award for the short film, Knocked Down, which he wrote and appears in. He was writing consultant on Prego, best comedy short film at the 2015 Manhattan Film Festival. Cowan has performed in comedy clubs throughout the country.

In 2016, author/columnist, CNN anchor and SiriusXM radio host, Michael Smerconish, devoted a Sunday column in The Philadelphia Inquirer to Cowan's takes on Donald Trump's opposite approach to running for president, and interviewed Cowan on his SiriusXM show about Trump possibly becoming Cowan's epitaph, for which Cowan, as reported in TV Guide TV Insider, apologized.

Cowan was a 2017 recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from Marquis Who's Who in America, and was doubly acknowledged in 2013 by the Writers Guild of America as a writer on the 101 Best Written TV Series, Cheers, Seinfeld.

His memoir, Banging My Head Against the Wall: A Comedy Writer's Guide to Seeing Stars, with a foreword by Jay Leno, was released on June 28, 2018. Media interviews included KCAL-TV CBS Channel 9; Los Angeles; KTLA-TV Channel 5, Los Angeles; KABC Radio, Los Angeles; WGN Radio, Chicago; The Michael Smerconish Program, SiriusXM; Coast to Coast AM with George Noory; The Michael Harrison Interview and The Adam Carolla Show on PodcastOne; The Jim Bohannon Show; and First Light on Westwood One. Banging My Head Against the Wall: A Comedy Writer's Guide to Seeing Stars is featured at the National Comedy Center in Jamestown, New York.

Credits

Partial credits include: Cheers (3 episodes plus an additional story, 1985–1987) – (writer) Throb (1 episode, 1986) – (writer) Take Five aka The George Segal Show, (6 episodes, 1987) – (writer, story editor) The Pat Sajak Show (1989-1990) – (writer, performer) Into the Night (1990–1991) – (writer) Seinfeld (23 episodes, 1994–1995) – (writer, program consultant) The Best Damn Sports Show Period (3 episodes, 2002) – (announcer) Only Human (1990) (CBS pilot, co-writer) Barely Fitz (1998) (CBS pilot, writer) Howie (2000) (Fox pilot, writer) Knocked Down (2008 short film) – (writer, actor, vocalist) Ellen DeGeneres - (writer for 2001 Emmy hosting) Phonees (2011 webisode series) – (writer, actor) Up & Down Guys (2010–11 radio show, KPFK-FM, Los Angeles) – (creator, writer, co-host) Another Talk Show! with Andy Cowan (2011 pilot) – (executive producer, writer, host) Our Time is Up with Andy Cowan (2015 pilot) – (creator, writer, host) Wannabes (2016 pilot) – (Co-creator, writer, actor) Donald Trump is George as "The Opposite", The Michael Smerconish Program interview, SiriusXM, March 2016 Is That Normal? with Andy Cowan (2019 comedy docuseries pilot) – (co-creator, executive producer, lead) Die Job (2019 dark comedy feature) – (writer) The Neurotic Vaccine (2022-- comedy/therapy podcast) - (creator, writer, producer, editor, host, Spotify For Creators)