Mike Esposito was born in New York City in 1927. He wanted to become an animator at Disney, but his parents wouldn't let him move to California. He then attended the Music and Art High School in Manhattan, where he met his future collaborator Ross Andru. After his military service, Esposito started doing comics for Fiction House and later DC, before starting his own studios with Andru in the early 1950s. As Mike/Ross Publications, they produced numerous cover illustrations. For DC, they illustrated several war stories, and for Standard Publishing and EC, they produced horror stories. Their production studio folded when the Comics Code was enforced.
Esposito and Andru continued their work for DC Comics. They worked on such titles as 'Star Spangled War Stories', 'Wonder Woman' and 'Metal Men'. After a short stint at Marvel, they made a poor attempt at starting a new production company. Afterwards, Esposito and Andru stopped their collective activities, and Esposito returned to DC and Andru went to Marvel. At Marvel, Esposito illustrated several 'Spider-Man' comics, as well as several other works under the pseudonym Joe Gaudioso. In the 1980s, Esposito became an art director at Archie.
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