James Burrows

James Edward Burrows (December 30, 1940 – June 19, 2026) was an American television director. He received numerous accolades, including 11 Primetime Emmy Awards and five Directors Guild of America Awards. He was honored with the Directors Guild of America Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015 and the NBC special Must See TV: An All-Star Tribute to James Burrows in 2016.

Burrows started his career with The Mary Tyler Moore Show in 1974. Burrows directed over 50 television pilots and co-created the television series Cheers (1982–1993). He also formed 3 Sisters Entertainment, a joint venture with NBC. He is known for having directed numerous episodes of comedy shows such as The Bob Newhart Show, Taxi, Frasier, Friends, Will & Grace, and Mike & Molly.

He executive produced the Emmy Award–winning ABC specials Live in Front of a Studio Audience, including Norman Lear's "All in the Family" and "The Jeffersons" in 2019, "All in the Family" and "Good Times" in 2019, and "The Facts of Life" and "Diff'rent Strokes" in 2021. He directed episodes of the revivals of the sitcoms Will & Grace (2017–2020) on NBC and Frasier (2023–2024) on Paramount+.

Early life and education James Edward Burrows was born on December 30, 1940, to a Jewish family in Los Angeles, California, the son of Ruth (née Levinson) and Abe Burrows, a well-known composer, director, and writer. He had one sister. When Burrows was still a young child, his family moved to New York where Burrows attended New York's High School of Music & Art. Burrows was a graduate of Oberlin College and the graduate program of the Yale School of Drama. Burrows then took a job as an assistant stage manager for the 1967 play Holly Golightly, an adaptation of the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's. The production was unsuccessful, but the job served as Burrows' introduction to its star, Mary Tyler Moore. He also went to direct the short lived Broadway play The Castro Complex. Burrows continued working in theater as a stage manager and transitioned into directing plays. Burrows directed traveling plays and a production at a Jacksonville, Florida, dinner theater.

1974–1981: Television director

While working in theater, Burrows wrote Moore and her then husband Grant Tinker seeking a job at their production company, MTM Enterprises.

Burrows is best known for what was his comic timing, complex blocking for actors, and having incorporated more sophisticated lighting in television studio shoots. He is also credited as having been one of the first sitcom directors to increase the typical multi-camera television shoot from three to four cameras. Burrows and the Charles brothers wanted to create a show where they could have more control. and its later three-year revival.

In 2007, he directed the pilot episode of the Chuck Lorre created CBS sitcom The Big Bang Theory starring Johnny Galecki, Jim Parsons, Kaley Cuoco, Simon Helberg, Kunal Nayyar, Sara Gilbert, and Mayim Bialik. In 2003 he had directed the pilot episode of another Chuck Lorre created CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men starring Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer. During this time he also directed episodes of shows such as the CBS sitcoms The Class, Courting Alex, and Gary Unmarried, the Fox sitcom Back to You, and the ABC sitcom Hank.

2010–2026: Revivals and recognition Burrows directed high-profile sitcoms during the 2010s including the CBS sitcoms Mike & Molly (2010–2016) starring Billy Gardell and Melissa McCarthy, and The Millers (2013–2015) starring Will Arnett, Margo Martindale, and Beau Bridges. Burrows reunited with Matt LeBlanc with Man with a Plan (2016–2020). He also directed the sitcom B Positive (2020–2022) starring Annaleigh Ashford. Burrows also directed episodes of numerous other television series including the ABC sitcoms Romantically Challenged and Better with You, the CBS sitcoms $#*! My Dad Says, 2 Broke Girls, Partners, Friends with Better Lives, Superior Donuts, and The Neighborhood, the NBC sitcoms Sean Saves the World and Crowded, and the Netflix comedy series Disjointed.

By 2012, Burrows had directed over 50 pilots for television series. Burrows directed over 1,000 episodes of television, a milestone he achieved in November 2015 with the NBC sitcom Crowded. To celebrate Burrows' achievement, NBC aired a special tribute on February 21, 2016, titled Must See TV: An All-Star Tribute to James Burrows featuring cast reunions from many of the series Burrows directed such as Cheers, Taxi, Friends, Frasier, The Big Bang Theory, Will & Grace, and Mike & Molly. In January 2020, Andy Fisher and Burrows won the Directors Guild of America Award for Variety/Talk/News/Sports – Specials for Live in Front of a Studio Audience: Norman Lear's All in the Family and The Jeffersons.

Burrows took part in two revivals of series he had worked on. He directed every episode of the revival of Will & Grace (2017–2020) with the original cast reunited, He appears as a fictionalized version of himself directing the show-within-a-show in the 2005 HBO series The Comeback, as well as its subsequent seasons in 2014 and 2026. An episode of Scrubs, "My Life in Four Cameras", had a character named Charles James in honor of Cheers creators Burrows and Glen and Les Charles. It was previously asserted in Sitcoms: the 101 Greatest TV Comedies of All Time (2007) that Burrows served as the silhouette of the customer who knocks on the door in the final scene of Cheers, but Burrows himself refuted this claim on episode 9 of the NewsRadio-themed podcast Dispatches from Fort Awesome, revealing that the actual "Man Who Knocks" was agent Bob Broder.

Personal life and death Burrows was married to celebrity hairstylist Debbie Easton; the couple lived together in Manhattan. Burrows had previously been married to Linda Solomon. He had three daughters and one stepdaughter.

Filmography

Acting Television Year Title RoleNotes 1974 Rhoda Agent Episode: "The Lady in Red" 2020 Will & Grace Himself Episode: "Filthy Phil, Part II"

Television Year Title