Michael began his career in a most advantageous manner, being born the grandson of Moe Howard of the famed slapstick comedy team, “The Three Stooges” and the son of Norman Maurer, renowned comic book artist, film producer, and co-creator of the first ever 3-D comic book, “Mighty Mouse.” With this hereditary boost, Michael soon launched a prolific writing career in animation as well as live-TV and film. Specializing in children’s entertainment and family films, Michael has developed series, story edited, written pilots and penned over 300 scripts for studios in a dozen countries. Michael’s story editing credits include the animated “Karate Kid”; the live-action teen sci-fi series, “The Zack Files”; “Mythic Warriors,” a half-hour animated fantasy adventure for CBS/Nelvana based on the Greek myths and the animated “Police Academy” series for Warners. While writing for children’s TV, Michael found the time to work on the great American (or more accurately, great Russian) screenplay, co-writing “Red Hot.” The film is a teenage drama/romance about rock ‘n roll in Russia in the 1950’s and stars Balthazar Getty, Carla Gugino and Donald Sutherland. Most recently, Michael sold an original animated musical comedy feature film for ARC Productions (fka: Starz Animation, the producers of “Gnomeo & Juliet.)