Meet The Man Behind Downey’s Dream Cars Show And Sweepstakes! (Our own Chris Mazzilli)
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How did Chris Mazzilli become the guy Iron Man calls for help? Dumb luck, hard work, well-placed connections? All three, it turns out. Robert Downey Jr. has played the role of Tony Stark and his Iron Man alter-ego for over a decade. He credits the Marvel character as the inspiration behind co-founding the FootPrint Coalition in 2019, an environmentally sustainable technology investment firm. A renowned gearhead with an impressive car collection, the veteran Hollywood actor has spoken of his struggle to square his recent climate activism with his former passion for gas guzzlers. When he decided to eco-mod six of his classic cars and sell them to fund investment in green technologies, Mazzilli was the man he called.
Mazzilli partnered with Jay Peterson, founder of Matordor Content, to pitch the idea of a show chronicling the modification process and a national sweepstakes to give the cars away. Downey’s Dream Cars aired on the Max streaming service in June 2023, and only two of the six eco-modded vehicles remain up for grabs. A ‘65 Chevrolet Corvette Convertible, modified by Rich Benoit of Rich Rebuilds in episode four, and a ‘72 VW Bus, modified by Mazzilli’s shop, CMC Dream Cars, in the final episode. The last two draws are fast approaching, and if you see yourself behind the wheel of either of these iconic builds, time is running out to enter Downey’s Dream Cars Sweepstakes.
A Long Winding Road To Success
A comedy club owner, vintage car restorer, and television producer, Chris Mazzilli’s business interests are as disparate as they are successful. A native son of Northport on New York’s Long Island, Mazzilli took a circuitous route to finding his purpose in life. Interested in cars from an early age, he briefly considered attending GMI, General Motors’ design and engineering institute, before setting his sights on Columbia Law School via a partial soccer scholarship.
“My grades weren’t super great, but I could play soccer,” Mazzilli said. “But I tore cartilage and ligaments in both my knees in my junior year at high school…, so I stopped playing.” With his knees and law school plans in tatters, he enrolled in a design course at New York’s renowned Fashion Institute of Technology and quickly decided it wasn’t for him. After attending acting school, Mazzilli found an agent and landed a few roles before starting work as a stand-up comedian. While working the comedy club scene, the straight-talking New Yorker would discover his true calling.
From The Limelight To Doing It Right
“These clubs weren’t really run right. I figured I could do a better job,” he said. “I’d met this Wall Street guy. He had some money, I had some ideas, and we built up this great little club.” Mazzilli co-founded the now-legendary Gotham Comedy Club in 1996. The Manhattan-based venue has helped launch the careers of such household names as Jim Gaffigan and Amy Schumer and regularly hosts Jerry Seinfeld and Sebastian Maniscalco. “All the things I did in life kinda led up to that,” Mazzilli reflected.
Although his acting career had taken a back seat, Mazzilli maintained an interest in film production and, in the early 2000s, was hired to help produce a movie written and directed by Robert Downey Sr. The project would stall at the pre-production stage, but the two remained friends, regularly meeting for lunch. “He was just a great guy and a huge comedy fan,” Mazzilli said of the late director. “We had a great bond, and I would get invited to family parties, and that’s how I first met [Robert Downey] Junior.”
Realizing An Automotive Dream
With the comedy club humming, Mazzilli resurrected his boyhood fascination with cars, especially old Chevys. A chance meeting with Dave Weber, a renowned Corvette restoration specialist, led to his next business venture. Mazzilli was keen on a car Weber was selling but just as keen to learn about the restoration business, and made the master mechanic an unconventional offer. “I said, ‘I’ll buy this car under one condition, that I can restore it with you,’” he recalled, “and it started a friendship with Dave.”
While Weber’s mechanical skills were beyond question, Mazzilli soon noted his chaotic approach to running the business was costing the shop money. “The thought was, if I can get into business with this guy, get the shop organized and run with a corporate mentality, there’s really something here.” Applying the same business logic that enabled him to launch a successful comedy club, Mazzilli partnered with Weber to form CMC Motors. “It took a long time to get it dialed in,” he admits, “but now we have a really great shop.”
With Gotham Comedy Club and CMC Motors to help run, Mazzilli still found time to continue working in film production, including the Gotham Comedy Live television series and The Lost Corvettes, which featured CMC Motors restoring 36 Chevys for The History Channel before giving them away in a sweepstake. Through these endeavors, he formed a friendship with Jay Peterson, founder of Matador, a production services company. Peterson, also a car guy, had CMC build him a custom ‘74 Bronco, which, years later, indirectly ushered in the next chapter in Mazzilli’s intriguing story.
The Stars Align And Iron Man Makes An Entrance
“Three and a half years ago,” as Mazzilli retold it, “Jay was driving the ‘74 Bronco in the Hamptons when he ran into a buddy of his, Jon Schulhof, who happens to be Robert Downey’s partner in the FootPrint Coalition.” The Bronco made quite an impression on Schulhof, who immediately enquired after the car’s builder and suggested they introduce him to Downey Jr. As any comedian knows, timing is everything. The actor-cum-environmentalist had just started figuring out how best to eco-mod his cars. Unaware the two had met years earlier, Schulhof passed on Mazzilli’s details, and Iron Man wasted no time reaching out to his father’s old friend.
Mazzilli remembers the call well. “Robert said, ‘Mazzilli, I thought you were in the comedy business… Can you help me modify my cars in an eco-friendly way because I want to sell them to fund my green charities?’” With a wealth of experience making the Lost Corvettes series, he immediately suggested running a sweepstake instead of selling the cars and creating a TV show to publicize the cause and the draw. Mazzilli partnered with Peterson, and in the Fall of 2020, they outlined their plan at a meeting with Downey and Schulhof in the Hamptons – Downey’s Dream Cars would go into production.
Downey had earmarked five cars from his extensive collection, and the last, a classic VW Bus, he bought especially for the show. A tight schedule meant that Mazzilli had just 18 months to modify and restore them while producing a six-part television series. “This is during the pandemic,” he recalled. “There were supply chain issues. We couldn’t get parts. So, we knew that, going into it there was no way our shop could do all six cars. We did three in our shop, and the others got farmed out.”
Two Dream Cars Remain, With Proceeds Funding Green Initiatives
Although Downey hosts the show, the cars are its stars and include classic examples from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. The first four, a 1972 Chevy K-10 pickup, a 1969 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE, a 1966 Buick Riviera, and a 1985 El Camino, have all been given away to sweepstakes winners. Only the ‘65 Corvette and the ‘72 VW Bus remain. Each received a green makeover, either an all-electric powertrain conversion or swapping out the original gas guzzler for a modern, ultra-efficient engine. In the case of the ‘Benz, the team opted for a biodiesel transformation.
Dream Car’s is not just another build show, and the series serves as a platform Downey uses to explain his reasoning behind modifying the cars and to showcase green technologies, including upholstery made from mushrooms, air sensors that collect localized pollution data, and solar-powered electric bike racks. Whether by design or necessity, the show highlights the yawning gap between the traditional gearhead mentality and the movement to implement green solutions while demonstrating the power of compromise to effect incremental change. Downey excels in making his point sincerely without climbing on a soapbox.
When I mention this, Mazzilli holds up his hands, “I will say this; number one, Robert’s a great guy, and two, he believes in what he’s doing. He’s not pushy. He’s very laid back. It’s like, ‘Hey this is what I believe in… If you’re into it, great, if not, that’s fine,’” he said. “He was great to work with, [and] more involved in the show than any of us thought he would be.” Downey had a hand in the design and updates applied to each car and even decided to tag along when the team met the owner of a VW Bus, leading to some great scenes. “We had a ball doing that, obviously,” Mazzilli said of the experience. “My partner Dave came with us. We could tell it was a rust bucket, and we probably shouldn’t buy it, but the [owner] was great on camera.”
It is tempting to lean on a cliché and label him a Jack of all trades or say he has a Midas touch, but both concepts are far-fetched, and, like any successful entrepreneur, Mazzilli has had his fair share of setbacks and missteps. If there is a common thread running through his myriad of roles and interests, it is the tenacious New Yorker’s aptitude for building meaningful relationships and acting on his ideas. Downey’s Dream Cars is nominated for two Emmy Awards this year, and a second season may materialize. Still, after watching Downey’s immaculate ‘65 Vette lose its big-block V8 in favor of an electric motor, I’m unsure if I could see the same fate befall his 1970 Mustang, a stunning Boss 302. I suspect Chris Mazzilli, an old-school gearhead if ever there was, might harbor similar reservations. Still, he would be the first to admit that mushroom leather is surprisingly good.
