Mark Frechette

Who was Mark Frechette?

Mark Frechette was an American film actor. He is best known for his lead role in the 1970 film Zabriskie Point, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, in which he was cast despite having no previous acting experience.

He appeared in two other films made in Italy and Yugoslavia, Many Wars Ago and La Grande Scrofa Nera.

He tithed his $60,000 earnings from Zabriskie Point and other films to Mel Lyman's commune.

Frechette was selected from among thousands during a casting process that lasted nearly a year. He was discovered in Boston by Sally Dennison, Antonioni's assistant and casting director, while in the middle of a violent shouting match at a Charles Street bus-stop. As Antonioni toured the U.S., experiencing culture clash first hand and shooting background footage, Dennison saw Frechette, a carpenter, scream and throw a flowerpot at a woman on the street. Another version centered on Frechette getting in a verbal argument with a person who was on the third floor of an apartment building above him, which is the one referred to in many interviews. "He’s twenty and he hates," Dennison told Antonioni.