Joe Medeiros has been chasing the story of the Mona Lisa theft since 1976. His award-winning documentary Mona Lisa Is Missing has screened at museums, theaters and film festivals in North America, Europe and the Middle East. It has aired on public television across the U.S. and in France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and Israel, and streamed on Netflix.

 

Over the years he has gathered more than 2,400 photographs of documents from the French and Italian archives: police files, witness statements, internal Louvre memos and Peruggia's own letters. He also spent time with Vincenzo Peruggia's daughter, Celestina, and her children before her death in 2010. He is now writing a book, The Housepainter Who Stole the Mona Lisa: The Lies, Legends, and Lunacy of the 1911 Theft.

 

Medeiros has appeared on Raiders of the Lost Art for Ovation TV and Museum Secrets Revealed for the Smithsonian Channel, and has been interviewed by MSNBC, NPR, CNN, the Los Angeles Times, the Financial Times and other radio, television and Internet outlets.

 

He began his career as an advertising copywriter. In 1988 he started writing jokes for Jay Leno and stayed with him for 22 years, 16 of them as head writer of The Tonight Show. His other films include the award-winning Sailing the Star of India, Friends of Independence, Doors of Florence and The Sailing Heritage Society, all on YouTube.

 

Joe and his wife, producer Justine Mestichelli Medeiros, live in Los Angeles. They have two adult children and three granddogs.

 

E-Mail: info@monalisamissing.com