Gene Cajayon was born in Saigon, Vietnam during the War to a Filipino father and a Vietnamese/French mother. As an infant his family immigrated to the United States, eventually settling in Orange County, California. From Ang Lee to Spike Lee, he is influenced by a broad range of contemporary filmmakers, and is committed to portraying a diverse image of America in his work.
Cajayon attended film school at Loyola Marymount University, where he began work on The Debut, his first feature film. A groundbreaking coming-of-age story about a Filipino American family, Cajayon completed The Debut after an arduous 8-year production process.
The Debut’s crowd-pleasing success on the film festival circuit inspired Cajayon to launch an ambitious theatrical self-distribution campaign. For 2 years, The Debut’s grass roots promotional team traveled to 15 major cities across the United States and promoted the film directly to Asian Pacific American and mainstream communities. Utilizing aggressive grass roots promotional tactics, targeted advertising and traditional media coverage, The Debut grossed US$1.8 million at the box office. The movie's extraordinary success led to a domestic and international distribution deal with Sony Pictures.
Cajayon is currently developing several feature length screenplays. Glass Street is a multi-cultural crime drama set in the San Francisco Bay area, while Saturday Morning Christmas focuses on a 70’s era Filipino American family in a small town in Central California. Glass Street was chosen as a 2005 Sundance Lab finalist from over 2,000 applicants.
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