Wisner Washam

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Wisner Washam is an American soap opera writer, best known as the Head Writer of All My Children, from 1981 to 1992. He was groomed by All My Children creator Agnes Nixon to take the reins in the 1980s while she focused on other endeavors. From 1981 to 1983 and from 1988 to 1992, he shared head writing duties with Nixon.

A native of North Carolina, he graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After working in local television and radio in Charlotte, he moved to London where he studied acting at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. From there, he returned to New York where he worked for four seasons with the American Shakespeare Festival in Connecticut and on national tour. Off-Broadway he was stage manager for The Fantasticks, The White Devil, and The House of Blue Leaves. He toured the USA as stage manager for Victor Borge, then worked with Mike Todd's America Be Seated as well as The Birds and The Orestea in the Ypsilanti Greek Festival. On Broadway he was understudy and stage manager in Neil Simon's Star-Spangled Girl, Plaza Suite (he also assisted Mike Nichols in directing the national tour), The Prisoner of Second Avenue, There's A Girl In My Soup, and The Riot Act.

After leaving All My Children Washam assisted development of the European soap opera which eventually aired as Riviera. He created the concept for a new Fox primetime soap, wrote briefly for Guiding Light on CBS, and was involved in the development of a German soap opera, Take Your Chance. He has written both a screenplay and a novel entitled The Cloning. He has won three Daytime Emmy Awards.

Washam married soap opera actress Judith Barcroft on June 15, 1969. They have a son named Ian Miller Washam (who played Little Phillip Brent on All My Children in the 1970s) and a daughter, Amy Washam Masterson.