Mardik Martin

Mardik Martin (born September 16, 1936),^[1] is an American screenwriter of Armenian descent. He was born in Iran and raised in Iraq.

Biography

Although his family in Iraq was wealthy, he fled the country to avoid the draft and arrived in New York in a penniless state.

In his book on the New Hollywood, Peter Biskind states that Martin had to wash dishes to pay his way through NYU, where he met fellow student Martin Scorsese in 1961. The two formed a close friendship and worked together on Scorsese's early projects such as It's Not Just You, Murray! and the semi-autobiographical Season of the Witch which ultimately became Mean Streets. According to Biskind, "The two young men sat in Martin's Valiant and wrote. In the winter, in the cold and snow."

Martin also shared writing credits on the Scorsese films New York, New York and Raging Bull.

In 2014, Martin wrote the screenplay of the German film The Cut, which won an award at the Venice Film Festival (La Biennale).^[2]

Awards

2012 Parajanov-Vartanov Institute Award honored Martin "for the mastery of his pen on iconic American films" Mean Streets and Raging Bull.^[3]

Filmography

References

Further reading

• Easy Riders, Raging Bulls (1998), by Peter Biskind (Chapter Eight: The Gospel According to St. Martin)