Daniel Lusko was born December 26, 1983, in Pueblo, Colorado. His mother was a pianist and painter, and his father, worked as a pastor and radio executive. Daniel was always passionate about making movies, and decided to pursue filmmaking as a career at age 14. After high school, he went on to study film at The New York Film Academy (both screen writing and directing). After film school, Lusko directed the documentary "Epicenter" based on the New York Times best-seller by Joel Rosenberg featuring Israeli Prime Minisiter Benjamin Netanyahu, which became a commercial success on DVD. After 5 years of directing documentaries in the Middle East and Europe, he landed his first feature film debut directing an action-adventure film "500 MPH Storm" with Casper Van Dien ("Sleepy Hollow") and Michael Beach ("The Abyss"). While directing documentaries, Lusko began developing the screenplay for "Persecuted" which garnered the support of Oscar-Winning producer Gray Frederickson ("The Godfather" and "Apocalypse Now"), Fred Thompson (The Hunt For Red October), Grammy nominee Natalie Grant, James Remar (Dexter), Dean Stockwell (The Manchurian Candidate), and Oscar nominee Bruce Davison (X-Men 1-2). In 2013, Lusko's screenplay was adapted into a hit novel by Bethany House Publishers. After receiving outstanding reactions from distributors "Persecuted" gained a wide US theatrical release, was picked up and released in over 30 countries internationally by Sony Pictures in 2015, and nominated for best-action film by The Dove Awards. Lusko's visceral-and-immersive style of filmmaking was dubbed "The House of Cards for the religious-set" by Politico Magazine, and Ted Baehr of Movieguide hailed Lusko's film "a provocative, suspenseful political thriller." Show less «