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| Diana Ossana | |
|---|---|
| Name | Diana Ossana |
| Birth date | 1949 |
| Birth place | United States |
| Occupation | Screenwriter, producer, novelist |
| Notable works | Brokeback Mountain (short story), Brokeback Mountain (film), The Long Goodbye (novel) |
| Awards | Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, Writers Guild of America Award |
Diana Ossana is an American screenwriter, producer, and novelist best known for co-writing the screenplay for Brokeback Mountain (film), an adaptation of a short story by Annie Proulx. Ossana has collaborated extensively with Larry McMurtry, producing work that crosses Western (genre), literary fiction, and contemporary film. Her career spans adaptations, original fiction, and advocacy for nuanced portrayals of identity in American cinema.
Ossana was born in 1949 in the United States and raised in a milieu influenced by Arizona and Southwestern culture. She attended regional institutions and early on developed interests in literature and film studies, drawing on influences such as Federico Fellini, John Ford, and writers like Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Her formative years included exposure to the publishing world via small presses and literary journals associated with New York City and Los Angeles, and she later engaged with screenwriting workshops connected to University of California, Los Angeles and American Film Institute programs.
Ossana began her professional life in publishing and literary advocacy, working with independent presses and literary agents connected to Random House, Penguin Books, and regional publishers. Transitioning into screenwriting and production, she worked on adaptations and original screenplays, collaborating with filmmakers and producers from New Line Cinema, Focus Features, and Paramount Pictures. Her career includes work as a novelist and short fiction writer published alongside authors represented by W.W. Norton & Company and featured in literary anthologies edited by figures from The Paris Review and Granta.
She has been involved with writers’ organizations such as the Writers Guild of America and participated in panels at festivals like the Sundance Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival. Ossana’s narrative interests often explore themes prominent in American literature and Western (genre) traditions, engaging with settings tied to Texas, Montana, and the Rocky Mountains.
Ossana’s long-standing professional relationship with Larry McMurtry began through mutual interests in Southwestern fiction and adaptations. McMurtry, a Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist associated with works such as Lonesome Dove and The Last Picture Show, partnered with Ossana on projects that adapted literary material for screen and television. Their collaboration included consulting on screenplay drafts, producing teleplays for networks like HBO and PBS, and developing adaptations of novels connected to the canon of American Western literature.
Together they navigated the intersecting worlds of Hollywood production companies such as Miramax and New Line Cinema, and literary institutions including The Library of Congress and university presses. Their joint efforts helped translate regional fiction into mainstream film and television narratives, fostering ties between literary authors such as Cormac McCarthy, Annie Proulx, and the film industry.
Ossana’s most prominent credit is the Academy Award–winning screenplay for Brokeback Mountain (film), adapted from the Annie Proulx short story originally published in The New Yorker. Other adaptations and original works include collaborations on projects inspired by Western (genre) novels and short fiction, and involvement in teleplays for miniseries linked to writers like Larry McMurtry and Tony Hillerman. She has been associated with adaptations developed for HBO, A&E Network, and streaming platforms emerging from companies such as Netflix and Amazon Studios.
Ossana has also published fiction and essays appearing in anthologies curated by editors associated with The New Yorker, Granta, and academic collections from Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press examining contemporary storytelling and queer representation in film.
Ossana received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay alongside Larry McMurtry for Brokeback Mountain (film), a screenplay that also earned honors from the Writers Guild of America Awards and recognition at the Golden Globe Awards and the BAFTA Awards. She and her collaborators were acknowledged by film festivals including Venice Film Festival and Cannes Film Festival for contributions to cinema. Literary institutions such as the Pulitzer Prize committees and organizations like the National Book Foundation have cited projects she shepherded for elevating contemporary American fiction in visual media.
Ossana has maintained a private personal life while engaging publicly in cultural discussions about literature and film. She has participated in panels with figures from Hollywood and academia, including professors from Stanford University and Yale University, and has served as a mentor in programs run by cultural institutions such as The Sundance Institute and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
Ossana’s legacy is marked by bridging literary fiction and mainstream film, helping to bring complex, regionally rooted narratives such as those by Annie Proulx and Larry McMurtry to international audiences. Her screenplay work on Brokeback Mountain (film) notably influenced conversations in film studies and queer studies programs at institutions like UCLA Film School and Columbia University. Emerging screenwriters cite Ossana among influences alongside screenwriters like Noah Baumbach, Diablo Cody, and adapters of literary fiction such as Peter Straughan and Nick Hornby. She continues to be referenced in discussions about adaptation theory in texts published by Routledge and Palgrave Macmillan.
Category:American screenwriters Category:1949 births Category:Living people