Debbie Allen began her show business career on Broadway in the 1970s. Her debut in the chorus of Purlie and her performance in A Raisin in the Sun were noted by stage critics, and in a 1979 production of West Side Story, her performance as Anita earned her a Tony Award nomination and a Drama Desk Award. Allen later returned to Broadway as a star and garnered her second Tony nomination, for a 1986–87 performance in Sweet Charity. In 1988 she choreographed Carrie, a newly composed American musical, with the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Allen’s stage presence and choreography quickly moved her from the Broadway stage to the larger venue of television. Throughout the 1970s she made guest appearances on popular programs such as Good Times, The Love Boat, and The Jim Stafford Show. Her roles in the miniseries Roots: The Next Generation and the special Ben Vereen—His Roots allowed her to work with some of the most prominent African-American performers in show business and to demonstrate her dramatic and comedic acting range. She also appeared in the short-lived 1977 NBC series 3 Girls 3.

In the early 1980s her portrayal of a dance instructor, Lydia Grant, on the hit series Fame brought Allen to international prominence. Although the NBC show was canceled after one season, the program went on to first-run syndication for four more years. Its popularity in Britain prompted a special cast tour there and spurred a “Fame mania” fan phenomena.

Allen’s success as a dancer and actor allowed her to move behind the camera to direct and produce. While still a cast member of Fame, she became the first African-American woman hired by a television network as a director in prime time. In 1989, after directing episodes of Fame, she co-wrote, produced, directed, choreographed, and starred in The Debbie Allen Special for ABC. She received two Emmy nominations, for direction and choreography, of this variety show.

In 1988 Allen solidified her reputation as a television director and producer by turning a flawed television series, A Different World, into a long-running popular program. Under her leadership the program addressed political issues such as apartheid, date rape, the war in the Persian Gulf, economic discrimination, and the 1992 Los Angeles riots. The highest-rated episode focused on sexual maturity and AIDS and guest starred Whoopi Goldberg, who was nominated for an Emmy Award. Allen was awarded the first Responsibility in Television award from the Los Angeles Film Teachers Association for consistently representing important social issues on A Different World.

In 1989 Allen made her debut as a director of made-for-television movies with a remake of the 1960 film Pollyanna. The telefilm, titled Polly, starred two players from The Cosby Show, Phylicia Rashad and Keshia Knight Pullman. Set in 1955, Polly is a musical tale of an orphan who brings happiness to a tyrannical aunt and a small Alabama town. The film was produced by Disney and NBC. Television critics hailed the display of Allen’s keen sense of innovative camera work, stemming from her ability to choreograph. The film is also notable for its all-black cast and for succeeding in a genre, the musical film, rarely popular on television. Allen followed Polly with a sequel, which aired in November 1990.

In the 1990–91 season, Allen directed the pilot and debut episode of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, a series that had high ratings on NBC. That same season, she di- rected a highly rated episode of Quantum Leap in which she costarred. In October 1991, Allen received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her achievements in television.

In 1992 Allen directed Stompin’ at the Savoy for the CBS network. This program included a cast of prominent African-American performers: Lynn Whitfield, Vanessa Williams, Jasmine Guy, Vanessa Bell Calloway, and Mario Van Peebles. Her most recent television series was the NBC situation comedy In the House. In this series, which first aired in April 1995, Allen played a newly divorced mother of two who shares her house with a former football star, played by rap artist L.L. Cool J.

Complementing Allen’s versatility as a television actor and director is a repertoire of critically acclaimed film roles. In 1986 she played Richard Pryor’s feisty wife in his semiautobiographical film Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling, and she costarred with Howard E. Rollins and James Cagney in Milos Foreman’s Ragtime in 1981. Allen’s debut as a feature film director came in 1995, with Out of Sync, starring L.L. Cool J, Victoria Dillard, and Yaphet Kotto. Among the other films bearing Allen’s name in the credits is Amistad (1997), a project she tried to produce for ten years before finally finding a collaborator in director and coproducer Steven Spielberg.

Allen is one of the few African-American women currently working as a director and producer in television and film. Her success in TV and film production has not deterred her from her love of dance, and she continues to dazzle television viewers with her choreography. In 1982 she choreographed the dance numbers for the Academy Awards, and for five consecutive years in the 1990s, her unique style of choreography was featured on the worldwide broadcast of the award ceremony. In 2003 she hosted a series on NBC titled Fame, in which she recruited and trained talented young dancers and singers, a show capitalizing on both the popularity of “reality television” and Allen’s own celebrity. For three decades, Allen’s contributions to television, on the three major U.S. networks and in syndicated programming, have highlighted the maturity of a performer and artistic producer with an impressive spectrum of talents in the performing arts.