He is the son of Anna Mae and Robert Michaels and was raised in the suburbs of Des Plaines and Arlington Heights. Michaels graduated from John Hersey Michaels graduated from the University of Evansville in Evansville, Indiana.
The Chicago native landed his first producing gig on the NBC series Midnight Caller starring Gary Cole. He next served as a producer Co-Producer of the acclaimed NBC series Reasonable Doubts, a one hour drama starring Mark Harmon and Academy Award winner Marlee Matlin For three seasons beginning in 1993, Michaels was Co-Producer of the ABC series : The New Adventures of Superman. The hit show starred Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher as the title characters. Some of Michaels' other producing credits include Charlie Grace, a one-hour ABC detective drama starring Mark Harmon as a private detective raising a 12 year old LeeLee Sobieski. Jim Michaels also produced Escape From Atlantis, a two-hour cable movie for Starz/Encore. Michaels' next project was the CBS series, Turks, starring William Devane followed by Cover Me: Based on the True Life of an FBI Family series for the USA Network. Michaels subsequently produced The Guardian pilot for CBS, the Odyssey 5 series for Showtime followed by Dr. Vegas for CBS. Michaels produced the Golden Globe nominated Chris Rock inspired series Everybody Hates Chris. This Show set the record for highest rated comedy ever to air on the UPN/CW network. With the canceling of Everybody Hates Chris after 88 episodes, Michaels joined the Producing team at Supernatural at the beginning of season 5 for Warner Bros. Television where he continues to see it to the end of the final season #15 until he moves into his new role as a Producer of the next TV series which is set to be announced at the end of Supernatural TV series. Michaels, along with Sean Astin, just completed a documentary, Remember the Sultana, with the help of over 930 Kickstarter contributors about the largest maritime disaster to ever happen in America. Michaels' been a featured keynote speaker all over the United States for various organizations including the AFCI and many Universities including UCLA, Academy of Art University and NYU. He is a longtime member of the Producer's Guild of America. Michaels is also a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences as well as Screen Actor's Guild and the Director's Guild of America. He has produced projects that have filmed in 9 different US States and 2 Canadian provinces. Illinois, Hawaii, California, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, Oklahoma, Florida, Ontario, British Columbia and Utah.
Awards
A veteran of the TV and Movie business, who produced shows such as Midnight Caller, and Everybody Hates Chris, Jim Michaels joined Supernatural in Season 5. Michaels is very engaged with fandom on social media, and was named by Entertainment Weekly as one of the "Top 20 Show Runners To Follow on Twitter". People's Choice Award 2017 People's Choice Award for Sci-Fi/Family TV Series