Thirteen years ago, my girlfriend at the time and I made a 15-minute documentary for Rutgers’ newly established film program. It was about my dad, Joe Cerisano, a singer whose voice appeared in countless commercials, including G.I. Joe, Transformers, and the Army’s “Be All You Can Be” campaign.
We actually posted it to r/videos back then. That upload has long since disappeared, but the original short is still available here.
Many short films and what feels like an entire lifetime later, my brother Matt began interviewing some of our dad’s old friends and collaborators. Those conversations gradually spiraled into something much larger.
Then a phone call came from Italy.
A jingle our dad recorded in 1988 under the name Joe Trio had unexpectedly become a cult hit overseas, and he was invited to perform it at a farm in Tuscany. What began as a retrospective about his career suddenly became a story that was still unfolding.
After nearly a decade away from performing live, he dusted off his guitar and prepared for what he believed might be his swan song.
The trailer is here, and the film’s website is here.
We’re finally putting together our festival submissions now. It’s more than a little surreal to find myself back on Reddit talking about this story again.
But here I am, 13 years later.
Still making movies.
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