Mitchell D. "Mitch" Hurwitz (born May 29, 1963) is an American television writer, producer, and actor. He is best known as the creator of the television sitcom Arrested Development as well as the co-creator of The Ellen Show, and a contributor to The John Larroquette Show and The Golden Girls.
Hurwitz was born in 1963 to a Jewish family in Anaheim, California. In 1976, when Hurwitz was 12, he co-founded a chocolate-chip cookie business, called the Chipyard, with his older brother, Michael, and his father, Mark. The Chipyard is still in operation in Boston. He graduated from Estancia High School in Costa Mesa, CA, and from Georgetown University in 1985 with a double major in English and Theology.
Hurwitz worked on several sitcoms in the 1980s and 1990s, including Nurses, The Golden Girls, The Golden Palace, The John Larroquette Show, The Ellen Show and the Michael J. Fox-produced pilot Hench at Home. He also created Everything's Relative, a midseason comedy starring Jeffrey Tambor and Jill Clayburgh for NBC in 1999.