Matzo Meatball

A Brooklyn-Italian daughter brings her Floridian-Jewish boyfriend home for Christmas to meet her mob-boss family.

MATZO MEATBALL is my first, feature-length screenplay that pokes fun at mafia movies with dark humor and a cultural twist. This 102-page script is complete with Italian-style jokes, allusions to famous mob films, cultural clashing, and old-world family rules.

The idea came to me as a joke at first — what would it be like to watch a comedic mob film that has a culture clash in the mixture too? Would people find it funny, or too cheesy? Then, as I continued to brainstorm and ask around, I found that people actually really enjoyed this new twist on a classic storyline. The Italian traditions were the easiest parts to plug in, as I celebrate the Feast of the Seven Fishes and take part in family banter that is included in the script. Researching about the mob, Jewish traditions, and some little surprises were tedious, yet rewarding.

As I went with the story, I jokingly pitched the name of the screenplay as “Matzo Meatball.” This script was my senior capstone, so when I said the name aloud to the class, they all loved it. From then on, it stuck.

The storyline takes place in present-day society, but comes with traditions of the past. The mobster’s daughter and protagonist, Stella, knows about and works for the mob in this one. Her boyfriend, Noah, cut from a different cloth, is the person she is trying to hide this life from. Will she succeed, or will he get caught in the crosshairs?