Joe Menendez

Joe Menendez (born June 23, 1969) is an American film and television director,^[1] who has moved seamlessly between the film and TV medium his entire career.^[2] He is a veteran of both single and multi-camera, comedy and drama, family entertainment and action, and of horror and rom-com. Because Menendez has directed 90 hours of television, written numerous teleplays, produced several TV series and films, and has directed seven feature films and TV movies so far, his diverse and varied credits show that he is a skilled craftsman and an accomplished storyteller.

Menendez was born in New York City and raised in Miami. He is of Cuban descent.^[1]

Television

Joe Menendez directed multiple episodes of "From Dusk till Dawn: The Series" for "Robert Rodriguez"'s "El Rey (network)".^[3] The series, which premiered March 11, 2014,^[4] is based on the 1996 Rodriguez film "From Dusk till Dawn" written by "Quentin Tarantino".

Keeping up with the trend of high quality shows being made for new media, Menendez also directed episodes of the "Amazon Studios" series, "Just Add Magic", which premiered in 2016, and The Prequel Series and "Uncensored" episodes for the second season of the hit series "East Los High" for "Hulu".^[5]

But Menendez still directed shows for traditional cable channels as well, having directed TV movies for ION and Lifetime, in addition to multi-camera shows for BET Network.^[2]

Even though Menendez has branched out in recent years to drama, the bulk of his previous TV work has been in the family space. Since the year 2000, Menendez directed multiple episodes for various Nickelodeon shows including "100 Things to Do Before High School" -- "Big Time Rush" -- "True Jackson VP" -- "Just Jordan" -- "Unfabulous" -- "Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide" -- "Taina" and "The Brothers Garcia" for which he won an "ALMA Award" for OUTSTANDING DIRECTING IN A COMEDY in 2001.^[6] Menendez also directed several episodes of "Kirby Buckets" and "Zeke and Luther" for Disney XD including the June 15th, 2009 World Premiere "Bros Go Pro" which scored record ratings, coming in #1 for the night, and in 2011.

From 2007 to 2011, Menendez was a director and/or producer on Disney’s "Imagination Movers",^[7] In addition to directing 1/3 of all the episodes, Menendez was a Co-Executive Producer on the final season, and Supervising Producer on the second season.

Film

Despite being American-born and raised, three of Menendez's feature film releases have been Spanish language movies.

Yet, he still considers each of them American movies, only in Spanish.^[8] He was once quoted, when discussing one of his features, as saying: "A lot of people pause and cock their heads when you say it is an American movie. ‘Well isn’t it in Spanish?’ – they’ll say. Well yeah, it’s an American movie in Spanish. To take that even further, everything in the movie is structured like an American movie. The jokes are primarily styled like American jokes. It’s really because we don’t know how to make a Mexican movie, a Dominican (movie) or a South American (movie)."

His most recent feature, "Ladrones (2015 film)", was released October 9, 2015 by "Pantelion Films"'^[9] The action/comedy reunites an old team of thieves and several new ones for the biggest heist of their lives. The film was shot on location in the Dominican Republic.^[10] and enjoys a CinemaScore of "A".^[11] It debuted #9 at the Mexican box-office,^[12] marking the second film Menendez has directed to land in Mexico's Top 10 on its opening weekend.^[13]

The film is the sequel^[14] to his theatrical debut, the feature film LADRON QUE ROBA A LADRON "To Rob a Thief" which was released by Lionsgate on August 31, 2007 and went on to boast a record-grossing opening weekend at the box-office for a Spanish-language film in the U.S.. The film follows two professional thieves who hire immigrants to help pull off a heist against another thief. LADRON blended Menendez's experience with action/suspense and comedy. The film was well received by critics, enjoying a 66% score at Rotten Tomatoes ^[15] and despite being made for under 2 million dollars, made almost 7 million dollars worldwide ^[16]

Joe Menendez's third Spanish language film, a romantic comedy called Quiero ser fiel (I WANT TO BE FAITHFUL), a.k.a. POR QUE LOS HOMBRES SON INFIELES? (WHY DO MEAN CHEAT?) was released in Latin America in 2014 and was in the top ten of Mexico's box office for two weeks.^[17]

Menendez was also a Co-Producer on another upcoming Pantelion action/comedy AZTEC WARRIOR

In 2002, he made his second feature film, the indie drama, HUNTING OF MAN ^[18] which Menendez edited, wrote and directed. It won BEST PICTURE at the 2003 "New York International Latino Film Festival" and the coveted FESTIVAL DIRECTOR AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE at the 2003 "Method Fest Independent Film Festival" where Menendez was also nominated for Best Director.

Menendez gathered $10,000 from his family, and made his feature film debut with the indie action thriller LORDS OF THE BARRIO ^[19] (originally titled THE IMPOSTOR), which was shot in 1995 and 1996, but wasn't released on DVD until 2002 ^[20]

Early career and other work

Once Menendez arrived in Los Angeles in the spring of 1992 with only $200 in his pocket, he worked a series of odd jobs: from ticket taker at 'Universal Studios Hollywood", to PA on the TV series "Star Search", while scrounging together whatever money he could to make many short films.

Two years later, he'd managed to work his way up to became a promo producer and editor at the LA based "Fox Latin America" and in 1994, at the age of 24, Menendez landed his first professional writing job on a TV series called CASSANDRA for the then newly formed "FX (TV Channel)" which was an American adaption of a "Televisa" telenovela, but the series was never produced. However, it did lead to HBO commissioning Menendez in 1994 (on his 25th birthday no less) to write "Cinderella" for their animated series "Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child" (Menendez also wrote "The Twelve Dancing Princesses" in 1996 for the same HBO series).

With the money he was paid by HBO, Menendez made another short film which ultimately landed him his first professional gig directing over 20 reenactments for the syndicated reality TV series "Real Stories of the Highway Patrol" in 1995.

Menendez continued directing television, only this time... in Spanish (something he never imagined doing).

From 1996 through 2000, Menendez worked almost exclusively in the Spanish TV world, directing multiple episodes for three different Columbia Tri-Star multi-camera half hours: "Los Beltran", VIVA VEGAS and SOLO EN AMERICA, which aired on the Telemundo Network. Menendez also wrote several episodes for "Los Beltran". Menendez went into half-hours after a three-year run on another Telemundo show, called PLACAS,^[21] where he directed 215 ten-minute reenactments (which is the equivalent of about 23 feature films).

He was a Staff Writer on the 2003 FOX sitcom, "Luis (TV series)", and from 2004 through 2005 he directed an episode of "Cuts" for the network formerly known as UPN, was a Consulting Producer on "The Playbook" for Spike TV, wrote two episodes for the PBS kids show "Dragon Tales", produced a reality TV series for "nuvoTV" called URBAN JUNGLE, and sold a pilot to "Nickelodeon" called COUSINS.

In 2009 and 2010, Menendez produced the live action segments for Disney Junior’s "Tasty Time with ZeFronk", live action music videos and end credits sequences for Disney Junior's hit animated series "Jake and the Never Land Pirates" as well as the live action sequences for a spin-off series of shorts based on Disney Junior's animated series "Special Agent Oso" called THREE HEALTHY STEPS and WHAT’S COOKING with "Cat Cora" for Disney Travel on Demand.^[22]

Early life

As a boy growing up in Miami, Joe Menendez originally wanted to be a Disney animator. At age 7, he then got his hands on his grandmother's Super 8 movie camera with the intent of photographing the hundreds of drawings he'd already sketched for what was going to be his first animated cartoon. But when he realized the camera wasn't equipped to shoot single frame, he started making live action films instead with his little brother and cousins. All through junior high and high school, Menendez made many short films on Super 8 and video.

Later while attending "Miami Dade College", Menendez made numerous student films on 16mm, shot a handful of music videos for local Miami bands, worked at Miami's Univision affiliate "WLTV-DT" Channel 23 in the Sports Department (where he learned to edit and be an ENG camera man) and also Miami's Jewish Federation Television, before dropping out of college and moving to Los Angeles in 1992 to become a director.

Personal life

Menendez is a founding member of "The Walt Disney Family Museum" in San Francisco and currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife and their young daughter.

References

External links

• Joe Menendez at the Internet Movie Database