Schultz was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the son of an African-American mother Katherine Frances Leslie (1917–1995), and Leo Albert Schultz (1913–2001), an insurance salesman of German descent. Shortly before his birth his parents married in Iowa, where both were listed as black on their marriage license. Mr. Schultz's occupation was listed as "Musician" at the time of his marriage. Michael Schultz, who was known as "Mike" growing up, attended
Riverside High School in Milwaukee, where he was a very active student. He played baseball, football and participated in student theater productions. After his undergraduate work at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Marquette University, he attended Princeton University, where in 1966 he directed his first play, a production of
Waiting for Godot. He joined the
Negro Ensemble Company in 1968, which brought him to Broadway in 1969. His breakthrough was directing
Lorraine Hansberry's
To Be Young, Gifted and Black, which he restaged for television in 1972. Schultz' earlier film projects combined
low comedy with profound social comment (
Honeybaby, Honeybaby and
Cooley High), reaching a peak with the ensemble comedy
Car Wash (1976) and
Which Way Is Up? (1977), starring
Richard Pryor.
Denzel Washington,
Samuel L. Jackson and
Blair Underwood all made their first feature-film appearances in a Schultz movie. In 1985, Schultz also directed the classic martial arts film,
The Last Dragon, starring
Taimak and
Vanity. On July 23, 1986, Michael Schultz formed his own production company Crystalite Productions, with his wife Gloria Schultz, and wanted to start producing three features in development. More recently, Schultz has worked in television, piloting episodes of such style-conscious series as
The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles and
Picket Fences as well as an abundance of TV movies. In 1991, Schultz was inducted into the
Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame. ==Personal life==