Lorne Michaels

Lorne Michaels is the creator and executive producer of "Saturday Night Live," the longest-running and most Emmy-nominated series and highest-rated weekly late night television program in history. In addition to his weekly duties on "SNL," Michaels is executive producer of NBC's new comedy "Up All Night," "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" and the Golden Globe-, Emmy- and Peabody Award-winning comedy "30 Rock" starring Tina Fey, Alec Baldwin and Tracy Morgan.

Over the last 35 years, "SNL" and "30 Rock" have won numerous Emmy Awards. SNL has been honored twice with the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award (1990, 2008) and was cited as "truly a national institution," and "30 Rock" also received a Peabody Award (2008). Michaels has personally won 13 Emmys as a writer and producer in television. Michaels was inducted into the Television Academy of Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame in 1999, and in 2004 he received the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. In 2008, he was named one of Time Magazine's "Time 100" - a list of the most influential people in the world. Additionally, he was honored by the Museum of the Moving Image in 2009, which recognizes two leaders in the entertainment industry annually whose vision and innovations have dramatically influenced the moving image.

Lorne Michaels has produced numerous motion pictures, most recently "MacGruber" starring Will Forte, Kristen Wiig, Val Kilmer and Ryan Phillippe, as well as Tina Fey and Amy Poehler's hit comedy "Baby Mama." Other films include "Mean Girls" starring Lindsay Lohan and Tina Fey, who also wrote the film; "Wayne's World"; "Tommy Boy"; and "Three Amigos" (which he produced and co-wrote with Steve Martin and Randy Newman).

Michaels' past television credits also include: "The Kids in the Hall," "Night Music," "Late Night with Conan O'Brien," as well as specials with Lily Tomlin, Steve Martin, Paul Simon, The Rutles, Flip Wilson, The Rolling Stones, The Beach Boys, Randy Newman, Neil Young and Simon and Garfunkel in Central Park.

On Broadway, he produced and directed "Gilda Radner Live from New York" and produced the subsequent motion picture "Gilda Live."

Michaels began his career in Toronto, where he attended the University of Toronto and worked as a writer and producer for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and starred in the comedy series "The Hart & Lorne Terrific Hour." In 1968, he moved to Los Angeles and worked as a writer for NBC's "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" and other television series until he left for New York in 1975 to begin "SNL."

In 1979, Michaels founded the New York-based production company Broadway Video Inc.