Daily Inspiration: Meet Michael Chait

Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Chait

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
I was born in Southfield, lived in Oak Park for a year, and then was raised and still live in West Bloomfield, so I am definitely a Michigander!!! Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve always loved Movies, and at first wanted to be an Actor. Then, in 1996 when I was 12, I saw “The Rock” on TV, which was directed by Michael Bay, and for the first time I really noticed how the camera, angles, movement, style, feel, emotion and everything about the filmmaking really made a huge impact on how the story was told, and made a huge impact on me, and from that moment I knew that I wanted to be a Film Director and nothing else.

I got my first video camera for my Bar Mitzvah the following year, and all throughout middle school and high school (I went to Andover High School in Bloomfield Hills, MI, which is now the Bloomfield Hills High School) I made short films with my friends in my backyard, and all over Metro Detroit – Waterford, Birmingham, Downtown Detroit, Farmington Hills, Keego Harbor, running around with my camera and teaching myself as I went how to shoot, direct, edit, etc. By the time I was a senior in high school and about to graduate, I had completed my first “feature film,” a 70s style action movie, which was definitely not “Gone With the Wind” but it was technically a feature as it was 2 hours long…that experience prepared me for film school, and I went to Columbia College Chicago from 2002 – 2006, which was incredible…I had no idea what I didn’t know, but I knew enough from my short films that I excitedly dived right into film school, and before I knew it, I was running around all over Downtown Chicago with my new college filmmaking friends, shooting on 16mm film in many amazing locations in the big city, while learning a ton from my teachers, some of which I’m still good friends with today.

I focused hard on directing and learning/becoming the best filmmaker possible while at Columbia, and I treated each class project like it was a big movie, putting a huge amount of effort into everything we did with a camera. I was lucky enough to be 1 of 6 directing students that got to make a senior thesis film in the “Practicum” class, and even though it was the hardest shoot I had experienced yet and not the greatest short, it wound up playing nationally on The Syfy Channel which was great as a brand new college graduate trying to get work!

After graduating in 2006 from Columbia, I stayed in Chicago directing Commercials and Music Videos, which was a struggle to get the work but definitely worth it to build up my reel and resume. I was lucky enough to be 1 of the final 50 out of over 12,000 filmmakers worldwide that submitted our work for the Steven Spielberg produced reality show, “On The Lot” in 2007 on Fox, and was flown out to LA for a week for filming, where I met some good contacts that would help me get a few more jobs over the next few years, and eventually managers that tried to help me get my first real feature film made.

After several more years of struggling in Chicago and getting closer but still no green lit feature, I moved back to Michigan in 2013, to West Bloomfield, and have been here ever since. I began directing for a film and photography studio in Warren, MI, “Stage 3” from 2013 – 2019.

In 2013, I directed a commercial for The Yankee Air Museum in Ypsilanti, based at Willow Run Airport, featuring their real WWII B-17 Bomber, which we filmed on the ground and in the air for real. That commercial lead to my first feature film, the WWII Action Movie “Wolf Hound” being funded by a local Michigan investor, Bob Lutz who had been one of the heads of each of the Big 3 Auto Companies, and believed in me enough to make my first movie possible, filmed in 2018 and 2019 in Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti, Waterford, Grosse Ile, Livonia and Farmington Hills, Michigan. Aerial scenes were filmed mostly in Virginia Beach and Suffolk, VA, due to the very rare WWII Fighter Planes being located there, but everything else was proudly filmed right here in Michigan.

“Wolf Hound” was made on a low budget, especially for an action/period war film, but came out big and impressive enough that Lionsgate, one of the largest Film Studios and Distribution Companies worldwide, bought and distributed our movie. Starring James Maslow of the band and show “Big Time Rush,” and Trevor Donovan of “90210” fame and many Hallmark holiday movies, “Wolf Hound” was released theatrically in a limited amount of theaters across North America, on streaming and on Blu-Ray/DVD in June 2022, and stayed in the top 20 new action movies on Amazon Prime Video for the first four months of release.

The movie did well enough that Lionsgate was interested in me directing a second feature film for them, and allowed me to get a major Hollywood Publicist at RMG (Rosenfield Media Group)/real representation for the first time, become close friends with one of the top Lionsgate Executives, and I’ve been working on Movie #2 ever since, which has several A-List Actors and larger filmmakers attached and hopefully will shoot this year in 2025!!! I’ve been working from Michigan the entire time, and I’ve been very lucky and happy to be able to work from home, spend a lot more time with my family here, and be able to work in the State and City that I grew up in and still love very much today.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It has not always been a smooth road! Any career in the arts is difficult to pursue, especially Film Directing as, like Acting, everyone wants to do it, but only a very small number of people are ever able to…it’s a very demanding job, very hard to gain experience/learn how to do it, and there is no “corporate ladder” structure where you start at A and then eventually work your way up to B, there is no clear path to get there, other than giving it all your effort, heart, emotion, blood sweat and tears, and hope to god that the right people like your work, like you enough, and believe in you enough to give you a chance to really prove yourself. It took quite a lot of sacrifice, from time with family to relationships to friendships, and a lot of punishing failures along the way, to get to a point where I started to have success. It’s also very competitive and ruthless, and there have been other filmmakers along the way that either helped me to succeed, or did not want to see me succeed, as they were either going for the same jobs, or wanted their own directors to get them first. The fact that I was able to build an extremely strong team, starting freshmen year in college and going right up until today, was crucial to succeeding and getting our first movie made, as it really does take a small army to do something of that scale, you can’t do it yourself! It’s also very difficult either getting hired to direct a commercial, music video or movie, or raising money to make a film…for every hundred calls/e-mails etc., you might get one answer back, and it’s usually a “no,” so you have to keep trying and not give up even after years and years of roadblocks and people saying no, or else you’ll never get that “yes” that’s one in a million.

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I am a Film, Commercial and Music Video Director and Producer.

I have always loved highly visual, stylistic, emotive movies and commercials, and that’s what I have strived to specialize in, especially action oriented, or on a large scale. Even as a student at film school, I was known for always pushing the envelope with “big” looking action, high-end/impressive visuals that look much more expensive than they really are, learning/knowing how to make any type of content look much more stylish/”fancy” through very specific photography, angles, lenses, staging etc.

I’ve been mainly known for action movies/commercials and music videos that feel like mini-action films, including the use of aerial photography, airplanes and helicopters as part of action sequences, shootouts using lots of special effects, chase scenes, fight scenes, explosions, slow motion photography, stunts etc. By the time I graduated film school, I had been given the nickname, “Michael Bay Chait” since my actual name is Michael B. Chait, which was a compliment from most people, but not from everyone that said it!

I grew up loving action movies as a kid, so I worked very hard to learn how to make my work look and feel like my favorite big budget Hollywood action movies, but without having the big budget to work with.

I’m most proud of my first feature film, “Wolf Hound” which cost very little compared to what is on the screen (Lionsgate told me “just say it cost less than 6M” because they thought the real number was too low!) “Wolf Hound” features real WWII Fighters and Bombers in aerial action sequences, big shootouts on the ground between Allies and Nazis, vehicle stunts, big production value, lots of extras, a strong cast of mostly lesser known actors, and enough excitement and emotion that Lionsgate bought and distributed the film…it was the culmination of all my film work so far since I was 12, and though it was a grueling production and many sacrifices to get there, I am very proud of it and wouldn’t trade it for the world, especially as it has already started opening lots of doors in the movie business that are closed to 99% of filmmakers.

However, one big thing that sets me apart from other directors, especially of the types of larger scale productions I specialize in, is that I truly try to go out of my way to treat every single crew and cast member with respect, kindness and make filming a pleasant experience…there is a long-held stereotype in Hollywood that directors of “bigger” types of films, especially action or anything of scale, are more often than not total jerks who yell and scream and belittle people/make filming a nightmare, mistreat production assistants and people “lower” on the crew list, and I always try and treat everyone as an equal, laugh and joke throughout shoots to lighten the mood, and not snap or yell at anyone if things aren’t going well…that is unfortunately rare, even in today’s world, and I pride myself in always treating everyone I’m working with with respect and kindness.

What are your plans for the future?
I plan on continuing to direct movies, with Movie #2, a Western hopefully filming this year, continuing to open new, bigger doors in the industry, and hopefully directing larger and larger productions as I go. I look forward greatly to hopefully not having to struggle as much in between productions, and to be able to make a new movie each year/every other year, like many of my favorite directors, and doing it within the studio system so that budgets are not as big of a problem as they are in the independent world. A big change might be having to eventually move out to LA for a period of time if it is absolutely necessary to grow my career, but I would highly prefer working from Michigan/home and just traveling for the actual film shoots when they happen, and not having to live in LA like you may have had to in the past to succeed. With modern technology and modern communication, I think that will be very possible.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.michaelbchait.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaelbchait/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MichaelBChait/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-chait-20748665/
• Twitter: https://x.com/michaelbchait