Diana Ossana was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. Her father emigrated from Italy to America in 1937. She attended Eastern New Mexico University in Portales, New Mexico, majoring in English/Political Science. She moved to Arizona in 1977. In Tucson, she helped to implement and establish a successful law practice for a corporation of 5 trial attorneys.
In 1992, Ms. Ossana began a writing collaboration with Larry McMurtry, which continues to this day and has expanded to encompass film and television projects that they write and produce.
The team has written two novels together, Pretty Boy Floyd and Zeke and Ned. They adapted two of his novels, Streets of Laredo and Dead Man's Walk, into acclaimed miniseries, both of which they also executive-produced. The two miniseries were directed by Joseph Sargent and Yves Simoneau, respectively. The duo later adapted Frederick Manfred's novel Riders of Judgment into the miniseries Johnson County War, which they also executive-produced, and which was directed by David S. Cass Sr.
Tom Hanks is slated to star in, and produce, the Universal Pictures film version of Mr. McMurtry's novel Boone's Lick, for which the author and Ms. Ossana are writing the screenplay adaptation.
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