Neal is an award-winning showrunner, television writer/producer, physician, author, and a public health advocate and expert. He is the first physician to become a showrunner, scriptwriter, and producer on a US television series.
After completing graduate studies at Harvard in education and sociology, Neal began exploring how stories shape culture and behavior. A Mass Media Fellowship from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a Directing Fellowship at the American Film Institute drew him from academia to media.
His first major show, ER, transformed dramatic medical series to come. As a writer-producer, Neal helped pioneer storytelling that combined the precision of medicine with the urgency of real life, earning Peabody and Emmy recognition.
He went on to showrun Law & Order: Special Victims Unit for eleven years, turning a crime drama into a platform for social change that became a hit television series. During his time as showrunner and producer, SVU tackled issues of sexual assault, mental health, LGBTQAI+ rights, and justice, sparking real-world conversations and legislative reform.
As showrunner and producer for A Gifted Man, Under the Dome, and Designated Survivor, he continued to explore how power, ethics, and empathy intersect. His stories moved from hospitals to governments, tracing the moral choices that define institutions and individuals alike.
Through Harvard’s Master of Science degree program in Media, Medicine, and Health, which he founded and co-directs, he teaches healthcare professionals and advocates to translate data into emotionally riveting stories, and those stories into action.
His ActionLab initiative extends this mission—partnering writers, doctors, and advocates to bridge the gap between inspiration and action, turning storytelling into measurable policy impact on issues from rape-kit reform to climate awareness.
As an author and editor, Neal has continued to examine the moral frontiers of science. His award-winning work on CRISPR explores how genetic innovation challenges our ideas of progress, identity, and responsibility.
Across television, academia, and activism, Neal’s career reflects one continuous experiment: proving that stories can heal, enlighten, and transform the world we live in.