“our scars are maps
of where we’ve been”
about.
An Amazon #1 Bestselling Author, Matteo Pizzolo was named Wired Magazine's "World's Most Wired Comics Creator" and has appeared on CNN, NPR, and FOX News.
While living out of a backpack as a teenager in NYC’s Lower East Side, Pizzolo got his start as a playwright in Hell’s Kitchen’s Ensemble Studio Theatre's Youngblood program.
At 19 he wrote THREAT, an independent feature set in NYC's hardcore punk & underground hip hop scenes. He went on to direct the film, shooting it on 16mm discarded “short ends” using free equipment rentals earned by cleaning up after classes at non-profit co-op Film/Video Arts. THREAT was eventually distributed by Sony (after touring skateparks and hip hop clubs across the US and Europe), garnering a Best First Time Filmmaker award at the Rome Independent Film Festival, Grand Prize at the Lausanne International Film Festival, and a theatrical release following its US premiere at the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival. He then wrote and directed the animated feature GODKILLER, distributed by Warner Brothers, which led to writing the comic books YOUNG TERRORISTS and CALEXIT.
He has written, directed, run labels, and/or produced in nearly every media format, and he credits teenage jobs at St. Mark’s Comics, Tower Records, Kim’s Video, See-Hear Zine Shop, and Kinko’s for his multimedia versatility.
Pizzolo always seeks to pay his opportunities forward by leveraging each project’s success into founding another platform for amplifying and elevating new voices. In 1998, he told Style Magazine: "When we were thinking of forming a DiY production company, there were no models on how to do it in independent film. So we looked to musical role-models like the Wu-Tang Clan, the punk Epitaph label, and the hardcore Dischord label. Now we want Kings Mob to be the role model that we couldn't find."
Since then, THREAT enabled him to support emerging filmmakers with Halo-8, GODKILLER enabled him to focus on new creator development with Black Mask, and most recently CALEXIT made it possible for him to support first-time political candidates and also to bring new voices into TV.
Pizzolo lives in Los Angeles writing and producing television, comics, and film.