Alan Ball: Conversations features interviews that span Alan Ball's entire career and include detailed observations and insights into his Academy Award-winning film American Beauty and Emmy Award-winning television shows Six Feet Under and True Blood . Ball began his career as a playwright in New York, and his work soon caught the attention of Hollywood television producers. After writing for the sitcoms Grace Under Fire and Cybill , Ball turned his attention to the screenplay that would become American Beauty . The critical success of this film opened up exciting possibilities for him in the realm of television. He created the critically acclaimed show Six Feet Under , and after the series finale, he decided to explore the issue of American bigotry toward the Middle East in his 2007 play All That I Will Ever Be and the film Towelhead , which he adapted and directed in the same year. Ball returned to television once again with the series True Blood --an adaptation of the humorous, entertaining, and erotic world of Charlaine Harris's vampire novels. In 2012 Ball announced that he would step down as executive producer of True Blood , in part, to produce both a new television series and his screenplay, What's the Matter with Margie?.