Charles Cotayo

A versatile/prolific writer, Carlos (Charles) Cotayo was born in Havana and raised and educated in the United States. English is his first language, although he speaks and writes Spanish fluently. He attended the Florida State University where he majored in writing, and received a Phi Eta Sigma Freshman Honor Society award for Outstanding Academic Achievement. Mr. Cotayo's fascination with motion pictures began during his childhood after seeing theatrical reruns of classic Hollywood epics and historical dramas. In his adolescence he "discovered" foreign-language "art" films presented on public television. His first theatrical feature film as writer, co-director and co-producer is "Decapolis II: A Psycho-Satirical Fantasy," based on a short story he penned for a creative writing workshop in college. The movie was rated R and had a limited theatrical run in Florida during the late 1980s. He also wrote the screenplay for the satirical "Deco" (his second collaboration with his younger brother, U.S. Navy veteran and award-winning filmmaker George Cotayo) in one weekend. The surrealistic thriller was filmed on a significantly "sparse" budget, but with an excellent cast of newcomers! These admirable, unique Cotayo Bros. productions are emblematic of their cinematic trademark: innovative (artistic) entertainment with a Miami setting, strong elements of satire, surrealism, touches of the "supernatural," dramatic intensity and suspense, with a distinctly original audiovisual style. He was Assistant Executive Producer and Director of Distribution of "The Victims" (1989), produced by a production company formerly based in North Miami Beach. "The Victims" would become a "landmark" in the independent film movement: historically, the very first theatrically released motion picture to dramatize (what were then considered "controversial") themes/issues concerning the transmission of HIV (as well as the profound--and within the context of the movie, traumatic--emotional/psychological impact/effect of AIDS) among heterosexual adults, opening at the top of the local box office charts (another historical achievement) in South Florida. In 1998 Mr. Cotayo began working as a journalist in Miami, initially as a general assignment and investigative reporter. Between 2000 and 2007 he won several awards for his world-class interviews and features on motion pictures, establishing himself as a highly acclaimed expert on the business, history and art of filmmaking. He considers his published interviews with Robert Redford, Rod Steiger, Liv Ullmann, Patricia Neal, Andrzej Wajda, Bernardo Bertolucci, Clint Eastwood, Ang Lee, Charlize Theron, Steven Soderbergh, Mel Gibson, Will Smith, Robert Evans, Shirley MacLaine, Rachel Weisz, Milos Forman, Javier Bardem and Jake Gyllenhaal among the [numerous] highlights of his prestigious journalistic career. For more than a decade, Mr. Cotayo distinguished himself worldwide for having interviewed many of the best (and greatest) actors, directors and producers in the international motion picture industry. Since 2013, his growing literary/artistic opus of digitally published "Cotayesque" novels include the four "debut" volumes of his epic, science-fantasy saga "The Dromernaut Odyssey"--"Dreams That Phantoms Hide," "The Astronedon Stallion," "Shepherd Of The Fowls," and "Cosmicus The Lover"--as well as "The Figments Of A Fabulist," a coming-of-age adventure, "The Wyngsdrenbourgh Goblins," a Gothic thriller/romance, and the thematically monumental "The Cruciate Of The Satyrs," a superb 2015 digital publication. With an indefatigable commitment to quality, excellence and impeccable ethical standards, his ever-increasing body of work has firmly established him as one of America's brightest, most diverse and respected writers.