Ilene Chaiken

Ilene Chaiken (born June 30, 1957) is an American television producer, director, writer, and founder of Little Chicken Productions. Chaiken is best known as being a co-creator, writer and executive producer on the television series The L Word, and was recently an executive producer on Empire, The Handmaid's Tale, and Law & Order: Organized Crime. Early life and education Chaiken was born in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania to a Jewish family. She studied at the Rhode Island School of Design and graduated with an undergraduate degree in graphic design in 1979. Career She began her career as an agent trainee for Creative Artists Agency, and as an executive for Aaron Spelling and Quincy Jones Entertainment. In 1988, she was the coordinating producer for the The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and the associate producer for Satisfaction. She then wrote the screenplay Barb Wire (1996), and the television films Dirty Pictures (2000), and Damaged Care (2002). Dirty Pictures won the Golden Globe for Best Miniseries or Television Film in 2000. Chaiken co-created The L Word in 2004, inspired largely by her own experiences as a lesbian. Her first romance with another woman, which ended in heartbreak when the woman revealed she had a long-distance girlfriend, served as a loose inspiration for the relationship of the characters Marina Ferrer and Jenny Schecter.