John P. McCann

John P. McCann
John P. McCann, 2008
Born	John Patrick McCann 1952 (age 64–65) Elmhurst, Illinois, United States
Spouse(s)	Joy McCann (1962–present)

John P. McCann is an American-born writer, actor and producer who has mostly focused on writing/producing animation and family-friendly scripts in the past. He is best known for his work on television cartoons, for which he has received numerous awards, but he has also produced live-action screenplays and television scripts. At present McCann is also working on short stories, and a novella. His fiction tends to be either darkly humorous or horror-related.

McCann was featured on a panel in July 2008 at Comic-Con with other veterans of Warner Brothers Animation, discussing Tiny Toons, Freakazoid, and Batman (the panel included Jean MacCurdy, Sherri Stoner, Andrea Romano, Bruce Timm, Paul Dini, and Paul Rugg).

Born in Elmhurst, Illinois in 1952, McCann grew up with his brother and his sister (Mary McCann, now a well-known radio DJ in her own right, based in Seattle) in the greater Chicago area—mostly in Skokie. McCann's first memory of making someone laugh is said to have been in a moment with his father. He did standup for some years in Illinois, where he met Arsenio Hall and Jay Leno.

McCann moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to become a writer. Distracted by acting for a while, he worked at two separate comedy improv groups— The L.A. Connection and M.D. Sweeney's Acme Comedy Theater (formerly Two Roads Theater; Sweeney has sold the theater, and now runs the restaurant and club next door, said to have been an investment of Acme Alumnus Adam Carolla). Writing comedy skits enabled him to hone his abilities with dialogue and narrative, and to explore the way comic timing is affected by the needs of a story: he was no longer simply throwing out one-liners. He reached the summit of his acting career, he claims, as a double for Duncan Regehr (as Errol Flynn) in My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn.