Josh Schwartz

Famous as reportedly the youngest person, as of the mid-2000s, to ever create, produce, and author episodes of a prime-time network series (he was 26 at the time), and as one of the individuals who helped resuscitate intra-program brand integration for scripted series dramas, Josh Schwartz bears chief responsibility for bringing the The O.C. into the world. As co-produced with former music-video helmer McG and aired on the Fox network from 2003 to 2007, the evening soaper -- its title an abbreviation for "The Orange County" -- dramatized the story of a public defender (Peter Gallagher) who takes a troubled young man (Benjamin McKenzie) into his upper-crust Newport Beach home. Schwartz conceived the series while a student at the University of Southern California; it sprang from his sociological research on Orange County. After The O.C. folded in 2007, Schwartz announced his launch of two additional television programs: Chuck, a comedy-adventure about a hopeless nerd (Zachary Levi) who embarks on a spy career when the world's most guarded secrets are embedded into his brain, and Gossip Girl, adapted from the novels by Cecily von Ziegesar, about a young woman with a secret identity who uses a blog to make public all the hottest gossip of New York City's elite teens. - Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide