William Joseph Bell (March 6, 1927 – April 29, 2005) was an American screenwriter and television producer, best known as the creator of the soap operas Another World, The Young and the Restless and The Bold and the Beautiful.

)[1] Bell grew up listening to radio soap operas when he came home from school for lunch[2] and late at night, including Life Can Be Beautiful, The Romance of Helen Trent and Our Gal Sunday.

[1] At the age of 21, Bell worked at WJJD radio as a writer for two shows, with the focus being teen problems.

While Bell was composing a sample script, he was informed that the writer who was supposedly leaving had decided to stay, so the writing job was not available.

She mentioned him to her aunt and Phillips remembered who he was; she also knew his wife, who was a well-known celebrity due to her work on local television.

William along with his wife Lee Phillip Bell created The Young and the Restless for the network under the working title, The Innocent Years.

However, before the show went into production, he had to rename the series as Bell mentioned..."We were confronted with the very disturbing reality that young America had lost much of its innocence,".

They renamed the series The Young and the Restless because they felt it "reflected the youth and mood of the early seventies."

[citation needed] As he did on Days of our Lives, Bell saw to sexuality also playing a major role in the stories.

Brenda Dickson, an original cast member of The Young and The Restless, claims that Bell blacklisted her after 15 years on the show after they partook in a secret love affair.

Bell acquired the Wallace Neff designed Sol Wurtzel House in Bel Air, Los Angeles in 1991.