After graduating in 2004 he went to Los Angeles to work for a film producer, when he had a
psychotic episode, was hospitalized and diagnosed
bipolar. He spent two years in and out of hospitals, stopped screenwriting and got into the
New York underground rap battle scene under the alias “Luna.” He applied to the graduate
filmmaking program and was admitted in 2006, but during orientation week suffered another psychotic episode, had to be hospitalized and withdrew from the program. There he also met his professor
Spike Lee who became a mentor and offered to executive produce a rap musical he had written while in the bipolar swings about the
Apocalypse. which would be his feature debut, originally titled
Mania Days, starring
Katie Holmes and
Luke Kirby - a love story between two bipolar poets who bring out all the horror and beauty of their condition, until they have to choose between sanity and love. Dalio began studying music in 2013 and after developing a passion for it, decided to score the film, composing and producing all the music himself. ==Touched With Fire==