Biography
Joe Rassulo, an Emmy winning director, has twenty five years experience in writing, producing and directing film and TV. In 1989 he founded Dream Street Films to create ideas, concepts and scripts for Feature Films, Network Television, Cable Television and Public Broadcasting. He has won numerous awards, including an Emmy for directing. He has since written, produced, directed, supervised and collaborated on more than 100 works including teleplays, plays, screenplays, promotional films, trailers, music videos and commercials.
His feature film Shattered is being repped Worldwide by Carlos Alperin of Galloping Films Ltd. (Australia) in the United States and in Europe and will be screened at Cannes in 2011.
Glen Sherley, a screenplay written by Joe and Robert Gibson is being produced by Joe Rassulo & Penney Cox and Sandra Rabins of Patchwork Entertainment. Tom Jane, currently starring in the HBO series, HUNG, is attached to star with CAA packaging. Billy Bob Thornton is in discussions as director.
His screenplay, Damaged, has been optioned by Crossroads Productions and is scheduled for production in 2010. Joe will direct.
His screenplay, Lena on the Seventh Day, co-written with his partner, Robert Gibson, and winner of the First Prize in the Geller Screenwriting Award judged by Ron Meyer and Brett Ratner, is currently slated for production in Israel and the US. Joe Rassulo and Pamela Rosenberg are producing. Joe is directing.
His two hour filmed docudrama on Divorced Fathers, entitled 8 short films about Divorced Dads, is now being distributed on video cassette in North America, and spawned Children & Violence, a two-hour CBS News Special with Dan Rather.
His film, Things Left Unsaid, featuring Chris Mulkey and Lisa Eichhorn, premiered at the Palm Springs Film Festival in 2001.
Joe also was written up in the New York Times as one of pioneers of Alternate Media having directed the first mobisodes, 26 episodes of Sunset Hotel, a Fox/Verizon original series as well as story editing two dozen mobisodes entitled, Love & Hate, also for Fox/Verizon.
Three of his screenplays, Belly of the Beast and The Girl Next Door and The Presence of Angels, the true story of Miracle Model, Sarah Fry, have been previously optioned.
Some of his other screenplays include On the Chase, the true story of the Last Great Outlaw in America, Kinney Wagner, Killing Me Softly (with Gherarda Castillo), Shane, Come Back , Parental Guidance (with Bruce Kalish) and Sonny Boy at the Grand Hotel (under 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" that won Best Picture at the 2003 VisonFest Film Festival in New York City.
As a director, Joe has also worked on numerous film and TV projects, including: The Journey of Allen Strange, a Nickelodeon filmed half hour TV show; Role Models, a National Public Service Campaign featuring 11 members of the Phoenix Suns, Arizona Diamondbacks, Arizona Cardinals and Phoenix Coyotes; Killing Time, a half hour docudrama, for the MTV/Nickelodeon Network sponsored by the National Institute on Drug Abuse; Dads for Life, a Five Part News Series and a Half Hour TV Special for CBS on Divorced Dads and their Kids, now being marketed across the country; 911 Earth, a half hour children's program on the environment, broadcast as a TV Special on NBC; Self-Esteem, Everyday Heroes, and KidStuff, a Public Service Campaign for NBC/Phoenix, and ABC/Denver. Winner of a National Emmy. He has also created, written and directed 18 episodes of "M-zone", a children's series for Pierson Educational TV.
As a stage director he has worked at theatres around the country, 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 and Long Beach (where he won a Best Director Award for the revival of Rod Serling's Requiem for a Heavyweight, ATOP and The Herberger Theatre in Phoenix, among others.
