Biographie
Joe Rassulo, an Emmy-winning director, brings 25 years of experience in writing, producing, and directing film and television. In 1989, he established Dream Street Films to develop ideas, concepts, and scripts for feature films, network TV, cable television, and public broadcasting. Throughout his career, he has earned numerous accolades, including an Emmy for directing. Joe has written, produced, directed, supervised, and collaborated on over 100 projects, ranging from teleplays and plays to screenplays, promotional films, trailers, music videos, and commercials.
His feature film Shattered is represented worldwide by Carlos Alperin of Galloping Films Ltd. (Australia) in the U.S. and Europe and was scheduled for screening at Cannes in 2011.
The screenplay Glen Sherley, co-written by Joe and Robert Gibson, is in production by Joe Rassulo, Penney Cox, and Sandra Rabins of Patchwork Entertainment. Tom Jane, currently starring in HBO's HUNG, is attached to star with CAA packaging, and Billy Bob Thornton is in talks to direct.
Joe’s screenplay Damaged has been optioned by Crossroads Productions, with production planned for 2010 and Joe set to direct.
Lena on the Seventh Day, a screenplay co-written with Robert Gibson and winner of First Prize in the Geller Screenwriting Award judged by Ron Meyer and Brett Ratner, is slated for production in Israel and the U.S., with Joe Rassulo and Pamela Rosenberg producing and Joe directing.
His two-hour docudrama on divorced fathers, titled 8 Short Films About Divorced Dads, is distributed on video cassette across North America and inspired Children & Violence, a two-hour CBS News Special hosted by Dan Rather.
Things Left Unsaid, featuring Chris Mulkey and Lisa Eichhorn, premiered at the 2001 Palm Springs Film Festival.
Joe was profiled in the New York Times as a pioneer of Alternate Media, having directed the first mobisodes: 26 episodes of Sunset Hotel, a Fox/Verizon original series, and story edited two dozen mobisodes titled Love & Hate, also for Fox/Verizon.
Three of his screenplays—Belly of the Beast, The Girl Next Door, and The Presence of Angels, the true story of Miracle Model Sarah Fry—have previously been optioned.
Other screenplays include On the Chase, the true story of America's Last Great Outlaw Kinney Wagner; Killing Me Softly (with Gherarda Castillo); Shane, Come Back; Parental Guidance (with Bruce Kalish); and Sonny Boy at the Grand Hotel (in development). He has also written for the Discovery series Black Hole High.
He produced the independent award-winning film They Would Love You in France, which won Best Picture at the 2003 VisionFest Film Festival in New York City.
As a director, Joe has contributed to numerous film and TV projects, including The Journey of Allen Strange, a filmed half-hour Nickelodeon TV show; Role Models, a national public service campaign featuring players from the Phoenix Suns, Arizona Diamondbacks, Arizona Cardinals, and Phoenix Coyotes; Killing Time, a half-hour docudrama for MTV/Nickelodeon sponsored by the National Institute on Drug Abuse; Dads for Life, a five-part news series and half-hour TV special for CBS about divorced dads and their children, now marketed nationally; 911 Earth, a half-hour children’s environmental program broadcast as an NBC TV special; and public service campaigns Self-Esteem, Everyday Heroes, and KidStuff for NBC/Phoenix and ABC/Denver, which won a National Emmy. He also created, wrote, and directed 18 episodes of M-zone, a children’s series for Pierson Educational TV.
On stage, Joe has directed productions at theaters nationwide, including the Public Theatre in New York, the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis, the Eisenhower Theatre in Washington, D.C., Actors Alley and the Variety Arts Club in Los Angeles, Long Beach (where he won Best Director for the revival of Rod Serling's Requiem for a Heavyweight), ATOP, and the Herberger Theatre in Phoenix, among others.
