• Home
• People
• Mike Lazzo

Mike Lazzo

Michael Lazzo (born April 10, 1958) is a television producer and the senior executive vice president in charge of Adult Swim at Williams Street.After he dropped out of high school at age 15, Mike Lazzo was roommates with Barry Mills, the creator of TNT's The Rudy and Gogo World Famous Cartoon Show. He began his career working in the mailroom of TBS. He went to program TBS's animation block, running daily from 4:30-6PM Eastern time until 1993, when he became the first programmer in Cartoon Network's history.In 1994 he helped create the first animated late night talk show Space Ghost Coast to Coast for the Cartoon Network. Then in 1995, Lazzo's newly named production company, Ghost Planet Industries, produced the first spin off from Space Ghost: Coast to Coast, Cartoon Planet which debuted on TBS, but later moved to Cartoon Network the following year. In 1997, Lazzo and GPI began production on Toonami, an afternoon block of action cartoons on Cartoon Network. In 2004, he served as the producer for Miguzi, another afternoon block of action programming, this time aimed at a younger audience.In 1999, Ghost Planet Industries changed its name to Williams Street and the following year the studio started developing more non-Space Ghost-related comedy cartoons aimed at adult audiences. The Brak Show, Sealab 2021, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force all premiered on Cartoon Network unannounced in the early mornings of December 2000, almost a year before [adult swim] officially premiered in September 2001. Keith Crofford has served as Lazzo's co-executive producer since 1994.