Caged Dreams

Role: Director & Producer · Writer: Paul Guzzo · Production: Guzzo Bros

A family production in the literal sense, my brother Paul wrote it, I directed and produced it. This is the one that cut our teeth on something more aggressive: an MMA film, with all the production demands that come with it.

I took a 5-acre lot near downtown and turned it into a working production backlot, sets for a junkyard, a bar, and an underground MMA ring and event center, all in one place. Nothing about that lot existed before we built it. That’s the part I’m actually proud of: not the awards, but figuring out how to give a production everything it needed in one location, out of pure knowledge, efficiency, and convenience, with no budget to fake it twice.

It went on to win Best Film, Best Short Film, Best Director, Best Opening Title Sequence, and Best Action at festivals around the world. But the real story is that this was the first time I built a studio system out of nothing. Everything I do now with Shear Media Studios and 211 Studio traces back to figuring it out on that lot.