James Henerson

 was a writer on Bewitched. He wrote twelve episodes for the series (1966-1968).

Biography
James Stephan Henerson was an Emmy-nominated writer and producer. Born in Brooklyn, New York, on February 16, 1936, Henerson grew up in Oakland, California. He earned a bachelor’s degree in history at UC Berkeley, where he roomed and did plays with future Incredible Hulk star Bill Bixby.

While attending UCLA to earn his master’s and gathering material for Broadway musicals, he took a job as a story editor on the CBS series Lassie in 1958. He went on to pen thirty-six episodes of NBC’s I Dream of Jeannie from 1967-1970 and twelve installments of ABC’s Bewitched from [1966-1968].

A staff writer for the famed television [studio] Screen Gems, Henerson also wrote episodes of The Partridge Family, The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, Combat!, National Velvet, Love on a Rooftop, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and The Second Hundred Years.

With partners Jim Hirsch and Michael Douglas, he produced the 1986-1987 ABC series Starman, which starred Robert Hays and was based on the John Carpenter-directed film.

He was nominated for an Emmy for writing the 1980 ABC telefilm Attica, based on Tom Wicker’s memoir about his experience as a negotiator during the infamous 1971 prison uprising in upstate New York.

Henerson won a Writer's Guild of America award in 1999 for the CBS telefilm The Love Letter, a time-travel love story starring Campbell Scott and Jennifer Jason Leigh.

He wrote and/or produced several telefilms, including 1985’s The Rape of Richard Beck, starring Richard Crenna; 1986’s Johnnie Mae Gibson: FBI, starring Howard E. Rollins Jr.; 1991’s And the Sea Will Tell …, starring Rachel Ward; 1994’s Getting Gotti, starring Lorraine Bracco; and 1999’s Mutiny, starring Michael Jai White.

He also scripted and executive produced a 1993 miniseries, The Fire Next Time, about the cataclysmic results of climate change.

James Henerson died on June 18, 2020, in his sleep at his home in Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles. He was 84. Survivors included his wife of more than sixty years, Marlene, two sons and three grandchildren.

Episodes

 * Baby's First Paragraph
 * The Dancing Bear
 * I'd Rather Twitch Than Fight
 * It's Wishcraft
 * McTavish
 * My Friend Ben
 * Once in a Vial (story) (teleplay co-written with Ed Jurist)
 * A Safe and Sane Halloween
 * Sam in the Moon
 * Samantha for the Defense
 * Soapbox Derby
 * Twitch or Treat (with Robert Riley Crutcher)