MAFIA VS. ZOMBIES!

ANOTHER GREAT SCRIPT OF MINE THAT TURNED INTO

ANOTHER SHOULDAWOULDACOULDA…

MIKE CARAVELLA

July 21, 2026

Great Title! Isn’t it? The script that I wrote back in 2014 backed it up, and what I thought, again, would be my breakthrough moment in Hollywood, turned into another missed opportunity, another great script decorating my office shelf, and another hard shove away from the “biz” and into indie film.

Still living in LA at this time, but definitely planning my exit strategy which came to fruition a year later in 2015, the idea exploded into my head almost fully formed one day while working out at the gym. That’s how all of my ideas come to me. I never sit down to “work” a movie script. Shit just pops into my head out of the blue, and I basically transcribe my thoughts.

The gym… Shortly after the LA LA LAND saga (Story #3) combined with winning full legal and physical custody of my son and daughter, my main industry networking outlet shifted from bartending at the neighborhood celebrity hangout to privately training college and professional athletes at the neighborhood celebrity gym. Once upon a time I was the youngest head high school football coach in New York State, and I was very good at it, until my first wife threw complete chaos and scandal into my life. I quit coaching in 2001 in the middle of crazy divorce and custody battles. Really it was only a backup to what I actually wanted to do. With my kids preparing to enter high school shortly, my son with sights on college football (he made it), and my daughter on cheerleading, me going back to the sidelines for the three of us to be together was a really good story. And I like good stories. You do too. That’s why you’re here.

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Being who I am, I quickly became the “mayor” of the gym. Not only was I an industry peer to all the entertainment folk there, but with my gregarious personality and my skill sets of expertise in Strength & Conditioning, particularly baseball and football, and being a big fan of both sports, the chit chat and friend groups were endless.

As mentioned previously (LA LA LAND), I met Chad Coleman doing just this. In 2010, I was holding one of my Monday morning quarterback sessions with a circle of friends in the gym when Chad, new to the community, was compelled by it and me, and inserted himself. It was love at first sight. Seeing him later that day chilling at my condo complex pool as my new neighbor cemented our fate as being close lifetime friends. It’s really family. Our younger sons grew up together. And even though they haven't lived in the same state together for years, the two of them are still on the phone everyday playing Roblox.

I also met screenwriter Michael Swerdlick at that gym. (Can’t Buy Me Love, Class Act, Love Don’t Cost A Thing, Doogie Howser to name a few.) Like the rest of what would become my closest friends in life at that time, Michael was a displaced NY Football Giants fan living in LA. We also hit it off immediately. We literally talked baseball and football every Monday through Friday working out in proximity to each other for years.

CAN’T BUY ME LOVE was Michael’s biggest hit, made Patrick Dempsey a star, and was so profitable that he got studios to make it for a second time with LOVE DON’T COST A THING. He had two new stories with outline drafts that we worked on, but what we spent more time on was a third iteration of CBML, this time from the female perspective and more modern as we were now in the cell phone age and that got inserted as a plot device.

In the middle of all of this is when the MAFIA VS. ZOMBIES! idea exploded into my head. The title, the story structure, the beginning, the middle and the end. Zombie madness was everywhere in that time period of 2013/14. The Walking Dead was the biggest show on TV, and my buddy Chad was one of the biggest stars on it. There were Zombie movies getting released almost on a weekly basis, and I definitely came across an idea that had not yet been broached and was completely unique to the genre.

I was so excited by it, I couldn’t contain myself. Chad was now living in Georgia for filming, but we spoke frequently and I would see him when he was in town as he maintained his apartment in the complex. I shared the idea with him and he shared my excitement. He insisted on me showing it to him the minute I was done writing it. I then shared the idea with Michael. He also was excited by it. So excited, he dropped working on his two new scripts, and the new version of CBML, and asked if he can co-write MVZ! with me.

How could I say no? I felt, even though his glory days were behind him, he still had enough clout in town to finally help me break through. And now I was going to sit side by side and write a script, my script, with a verified, notable, profitable, hit movie maker. As he was the “name”, he asked for 60% to my 40%. I was dead broke so that was an easy decision for me. In return I asked for top billing in the writing credits. Done deal, contract signed. We started work the next week.

I followed Michael’s lead during our sessions, and learned a helluva lot. It was very business-like. As we were both very rigid schedule keepers, we blocked out times to work. Monday through Friday everyday from 2pm until 6pm we wrote. We did that religiously for two months, and it was done. Just like that. The idea was all there in my head. Michael seamlessly knew how to construct the sequences, and came up with great bridges and transitions to fully form my ideas. It all went really smooth and easy. And it was good!

Upon Michael’s insistence, even though we were going to chase some names, we wrote a supporting part for me. He believed in my talent as an actor and in my captivating personality as he would always call me “the new Joe Pesci!” One notable name that was easily locked in was the newly big star, and my buddy the zombie killer, Chad Coleman. His character was major but neither Mafia nor Zombie, as you can probably deduce. I will not get into the specifics of the script’s story, because you never know… one of my many new indie horror producer friends might read this and want to fund it!

Ray Liotta, Michael Imperioli, and Frank Vincent were the three names we were in hot pursuit for. Swerdlick thought he had an inside track to Ray as he was really good friends with his wife. With Frank, we were actually able to get a verbal commitment because of both of our connections to him. I had a co-star day on THE SOPRANOS in 2002 and my scene was with Frank, so we hung out together the whole day and ate lunch together, and I got to know him. And he got to know, and remember, me. My scene was cut but I got paid and got residuals, so that's a big win in actor world. Swerdlick’s connection to Frank was that he used to date his manager and was still friendly with her, so we were able to get that all solidified pretty quickly. Imperioli neither of us knew at all, but we figured once we locked in Ray and Frank and found our director, he wouldn’t be too hard to get to commit. While we waited for Ray and Imperioli, we included them in our business plan (that's normal) and started pursuing directors, and producers (money).

To accomplish these goals, as Swerdlick and I figured the script to be in the $5-10M range, we needed access to a big fish. Here’s where my buddy John from William Morris Endeavor enters the story again. Swerdlick, once upon a time, was a William Morris agent himself. And when he was on top of his game, he was repped by one of their bigger agents, Rob Carlson. Swerdlick asked me to ask John to get him in the room with Carlson. In spite of me being the nobody in this collection of Hollywood elites, I was able to get John to put together the meeting.

The meeting went well, but I was nowhere near it. Apparently I’m only good enough to put it together, not be invited. Carlson connected Swerdlick to Producer Nick Meyer (SAW II, SAW III), and Swerdlick got the script to him. As Meyer was connected with Darren Lynn Bousman and Shawnee Smith, we added them to our pursuit as Director and Lead Actress and put them in our business plan as well.

Meyer read the script, and reported back to Swerdlick. “This script is really really good. Better than the script I just backed, PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES. But I just put $30M into that and I’m not betting against myself.” Once again, love for one of my scripts. And once again just as the ocean seemed to be parting for me, it began to crash back together. The market started to become oversaturated with Zombie movies. It was going to take a bit more elbow grease to get things done. And that was something Swerdlick was not interested in at all.

Just as quickly as things came together for MAFIA VS. ZOMBIES!, it started its path to oblivion just as quick. Swerdlick just wasn’t interested in going the true indie route with the movie. He was used to walking scripts into production studios and agents, and getting checks on the spot. He would always tell me “Mike, once you sell one, you’ll sell 12.” But there he was, getting in the way of me selling #1. No matter what I came up with, if it wasn’t big shots making big deals, he wasn’t the least bit interested. And he was my partner. We had a signed deal. So I couldn’t do anything without him.

We stayed friends but things got testy a few times. He would complain to me and accuse John and Chad of not doing enough to help me. That they were practicing schadenfreude on me. I don’t disagree with that at all. But he was doing the same exact thing. He also was feeling a bit sorry for himself and saying the business has passed him by. He never wrote again. Must be an easier decision to make when you're living up on Mulholland Drive. So after a few more meager attempts to try and get something done in a flooded market with no help, I put MAFIA VS. ZOMBIES! on the shelf where it remains to this day.

And that also closed the chapter of my time in LA. With the two older kids graduated from HS, and the younger one not quite ready for school yet, and me having enough of being Hollywood’s punching bag while trying to figure out how to pay my bills every month, a change was needed. So off to Florida we went. At least temporarily.

And thus began my impersonation of the phoenix…

Soon after, we became closer than casual gym-space neighbors. I told Michael about the whole LA LA LAND clusterfuck, and asked him to check it out. This was after Showtime’s thievery and I reconceptualized it into a feature script. He hemmed and hawed. “Mike… you don’t want my opinion. I’m pretty ruthless in my critiques and have lost friends over it in the past,” he would say. I convinced him that I’m a pretty thick-skinned guy and would value whatever he gave me. He went on, “Alright. Give me the DVD, the original pilot script, and the feature script on Friday. I’ll have a full report on Monday. Be prepared to not want to be my friend anymore.” I was excited by the opportunity to be judged by a legitimate multiple hit screenwriter and delivered the goods that Friday.

Monday morning comes and I’m at the gym 15 minutes before Michael arrives, right on point for both of our OCD ritualistic schedule keeping. Michael approaches me. “I gotta tell you Mike. I’ve read and watched a lot of things from successful screenwriters who wanted my opinion, and I ripped them apart. But you did it man. This is really good. You walk the walk.” And there it was. More validation from highly successful people, now close friends, in the industry. John from William Morris (stories 2 &3), Chad, Michael, and a host of others. Lots of validation, lots of street credit. No completed projects, and no money.

As Michael and I grew closer, our time together extended out to going to lunches together, and getting beers on the weekends. Michael at this point had stopped writing feature scripts and was fully immersed in producing Reality TV and making bank. But it was shallow and he hated it. Even still, he invited me to do voiceover narration on a new Reality concept of his that he was starting to shop around, “BROOKLYN BEACH CLUB”. A part of that “Sizzle Reel” (proof of concept) is up on my YouTube page.

Sometime in 2012/13, after LA LA LAND breathed its last breath and Michael’s Reality TV action started to dry up, he decided he wanted to venture back into feature films. He asked me if I wanted to help him. We’d go to lunch a few times a week, he’d bring his ideas, and we’d workshop them together. He’d pay me under the table and I’d get no credit. “Ghostwriting” is what they call it in the biz. And that's what I became. Michael Swerdlick’s Ghostwriter.

Also at this point, Chad’s character, Tyrese, was getting killed off THE WALKING DEAD, and as they did at that time, after your final episode, they featured you on the after show, THE TALKING DEAD with Chris Hardwick. Chad was eager to drop the name of his next projects on the air, and I wanted him to, but Swerdlick did not, afraid someone would steal the name before we got funded. I was there in the studio that night, and Chad still tried to work his way through teasing MVZ!, and in the video below you can hear me pipe up from the audience. Was it the right choice to not say the name? I don’t know. Hindsight is 20/20. Today I think we should have absolutely dropped the name.