Michael is a Latino-Jewish, award-winning writer and director from Los Angeles. After a career building haunted houses and working as a scare actor for Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios, Michael was accepted as a directing fellow at the AFI Conservatory. His recent short, "STALLED", won the Jack Larson Southern California Filmmaker Award as part of KCET's Fine Cut Film Festival. Michael's AFI thesis film, "Magdalena", was selected as one of twelve filmmakers for the 7th annual CAA Moebius showcase, won the 2022 Golden Tadpole at EnergaCamerimage, and was shortlisted for this year's Yugo BAFTA student awards. The film was recently acquired by Cinedigm to be featured on their horror platform, Bloody Disgusting. Michael is the creative director for Cadence13's and Dark Horse Entertainment's "WEAPONIZED" podcast -- which covers the subject of UFO's and the paranormal with filmmaker Jeremy Corbell and investigative journalist George Knapp (currently one of the top science podcasts on Spotify). The podcast is being developed into a series. Michael's most recent short, Juliette Wasn't Invited Tonight, is about the fear of being alone and excluded. A fear that many teens come across in high-school. In "Juliette Wasn't Invited Tonight", an evil entity feeds off of this vulnerable fear. Read less