John J. Strauss

John J. Strauss is an American producer and writer of film and television.

He has written and produced for the television series ''Boy Meets World'' (and known as the writer who came up with the character name for Topanga Lawrence, naming her after Topanga Canyon), ''Me and the Boys'' and ''Odd Man Out''. He has also written several episodes of the Amazon series ''Mozart in the Jungle'', which received a Golden Globe Award nomination for "Best TV Series Comedy" in 2015. He is an executive producer for ''The Breaks''.

Since 1998, Strauss has mainly focused on films, co-writing the screenplays for ''There's Something About Mary'' (1998), ''Head Over Heels'' (2001), ''The Santa Clause 2'', ''The Lizzie McGuire Movie'' (2003), ''Rebound'' (2005), ''The Wild'' (2006), ''The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause'' (2006), ''You Again'' (2010). and ''Free Birds'' (2013).

He cast Eric the Actor in an episode of the TV show ''In Plain Sight'', with Eric playing a disgruntled midget landlord during a story involving the FBI investigating a hoarder. Eric ad-libbed the line "Keys, woman" when the script called for him to hold the keys himself—something his disability made difficult due to his deformed hands.

He frequently collaborates with fellow producer and writer Ed Decter. He, along with Decter replaced Barry Kemp as showrunner of the CBS Tom Selleck comedy ''The Closer'', which eventually came out in 1998.

Strauss is also a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and UCLA, where he received a BFA degree in Motion Picture (Film) and TV. Provided by Wikipedia