\n\tJohn Masius, the writer and producer who won two Emmys for his work on St. Elsewhere and created the uplifting network dramas Touched by an Angel and Providence, has died. He was 75.<\/p>\n
\n\tMasius died Saturday at his home in Los Angeles after a nine-month decline from ALS, his ex-wife, actress Ellen Bry, announced. She played nurse Shirley Daniels on St. Elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\n\tMasius, who started out in the early 1980s on the CBS drama The White Shadow, also created the 2009-11 TNT medical show Hawthorne, starring Jada Pinkett Smith and Michael Vartan, and he also wrote and\/or produced for NBC\u2019s L.A. Law and Showtime\u2019s Dead Like Me during his long career.<\/p>\n
\n\tWith frequent collaborator Mark Tinker, Masius developed NBC\u2019s St. Elsewhere, set at a fictional Boston hospital. He wrote and produced for the show during entire six-season run (1982-87), receiving writing Emmys in 1984 and \u201986 amid 14 nominations for his work there.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe spiritual Touched by an Angel, starring Roma Downey and Della Reese<\/a>, lasted nine seasons (1994-2003) on CBS, and the medical show Providence, starring Melina Kanakaredes and Mike Farrell, ran for five (1999-2002). Both series were bathed in warmth and heart.<\/p>\n \n\tMasius was born in Manhattan on July 30, 1950, and raised in Scarsdale, New York. After graduating from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, he moved to Los Angeles and earned a master\u2019s degree from UCLA\u2019s Anderson School of Management.<\/p>\n \n\tMasius was working as a waiter at a cafe on Venice Beach when a chance meeting with producer Bruce Paltrow led him to becoming a production assistant on Paltrow\u2019s The White Shadow, starring Ken Howard<\/a>.<\/p>\n \n\tHe graduated to writer and coordinating producer on the series and in 1981 shared an Emmy nom for outstanding drama series with Paltrow and Tinker.<\/p>\n \n\tAfter The White Shadow ended after three seasons, he, Paltrow and Tinker moved to St. Elsewhere, another product of MTM Enterprises, then led by Grant Tinker<\/a> (Mark Tinker\u2019s father).<\/p>\n \n\tMasius also developed NBC\u2019s 1990-91 adaptation of Ferris Bueller\u2019s Day Off and wrote for CBS\u2019 Brooklyn Bridge, created by Gary David Goldberg<\/a>, in 1991-92.<\/p>\n