Mark Frechette

Mark Frechette (December 4, 1947 – September 27, 1975) 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, Many Wars Ago (Uomini Contro, 1970) and La Grande Scrofa Nera (1971).

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

Frechette, who had no formal acting experience, 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.

Despite the film being a critical and box office failure, Frechette enjoyed a period of considerable publicity, his face gracing the covers of Look Magazine in November 1969 and Rolling Stone magazine on March 7, 1970.

On August 29, 1973, he and two members of the Fort Hill commune attempted to rob the New England Merchant's Bank in the Fort Hill section of Roxbury, a poor neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. One of the members of the commune, Christopher "Herc" Thien, was killed by police and Frechette was arrested and sentenced to the minimum security state prison in Norfolk, Massachusetts. He died under highly suspicious circumstances during an apparent weightlifting accident when a 150-pound bar fell on his neck, choking him to death. Prison officials did not suspect foul play; however, questions arose whether Frechette had been suffering from depression.

External links

• Mark Frechette at the Internet Movie Database
• The Sorry Life & Death of Mark Frechette by DAVE O'BRIAN
• Return to Zabriskie Point: The Mark Frechette and Daria Halprin Story at Confessions of a Pop Culture Addict
• Mark Frechette at the Internet Movie Database