diff --git a/ec2/spark-ec2 b/ec2/spark-ec2
index 31f9771223e51e4439fe1d752a6d75cd22f35065..4aa908242eeaa6fde925a834ff79a911fd072fc1 100755
--- a/ec2/spark-ec2
+++ b/ec2/spark-ec2
@@ -18,5 +18,9 @@
 # limitations under the License.
 #
 
-cd "`dirname $0`"
-PYTHONPATH="./third_party/boto-2.4.1.zip/boto-2.4.1:$PYTHONPATH" python ./spark_ec2.py "$@"
+# Preserve the user's CWD so that relative paths are passed correctly to 
+#+ the underlying Python script.
+SPARK_EC2_DIR="$(dirname $0)"
+
+PYTHONPATH="${SPARK_EC2_DIR}/third_party/boto-2.4.1.zip/boto-2.4.1:$PYTHONPATH" \
+    python "${SPARK_EC2_DIR}/spark_ec2.py" "$@"
diff --git a/ec2/spark_ec2.py b/ec2/spark_ec2.py
index 50f88f735650e37976471c5ec0ca7a2168739a0f..a5396c23759154dcb70bba0baee0fdb6283a14d0 100755
--- a/ec2/spark_ec2.py
+++ b/ec2/spark_ec2.py
@@ -40,6 +40,7 @@ from boto.ec2.blockdevicemapping import BlockDeviceMapping, BlockDeviceType, EBS
 from boto import ec2
 
 DEFAULT_SPARK_VERSION = "1.1.0"
+SPARK_EC2_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
 
 MESOS_SPARK_EC2_BRANCH = "v4"
 # A URL prefix from which to fetch AMI information
@@ -593,7 +594,14 @@ def setup_cluster(conn, master_nodes, slave_nodes, opts, deploy_ssh_key):
     )
 
     print "Deploying files to master..."
-    deploy_files(conn, "deploy.generic", opts, master_nodes, slave_nodes, modules)
+    deploy_files(
+        conn=conn,
+        root_dir=SPARK_EC2_DIR + "/" + "deploy.generic",
+        opts=opts,
+        master_nodes=master_nodes,
+        slave_nodes=slave_nodes,
+        modules=modules
+    )
 
     print "Running setup on master..."
     setup_spark_cluster(master, opts)
@@ -730,6 +738,8 @@ def get_num_disks(instance_type):
 # cluster (e.g. lists of masters and slaves). Files are only deployed to
 # the first master instance in the cluster, and we expect the setup
 # script to be run on that instance to copy them to other nodes.
+#
+# root_dir should be an absolute path to the directory with the files we want to deploy.
 def deploy_files(conn, root_dir, opts, master_nodes, slave_nodes, modules):
     active_master = master_nodes[0].public_dns_name