MARK BURCHARD A card-carrying member of Actor’s Equity and SAG-AFTRA, and a retired member of IATSE Locals 764, 744, and 705, Mark Burchard discovered he had a natural gift for costuming after auditioning for The New York City Opera and found himself banished to their sub-basement wardrobe department at Lincoln Center in 1971. He subsequently became the Men’s Costumer of the original Saturday Night Live, survived 53 episodes, and quickly moved on to film. In all, he has 8 Broadway shows including (David Mamet’s Speed the Plow starring Madonna) innumerable operas (The Metropolitan Opera, The New York City Opera) and ballets, (The New York City Ballet, The Royal Ballet with Nureyev and Fontaine, The Stuttgart) and over 70 feature films and television series to his credit. His films, which have run the gamut from the sublime to the ridiculous, have garnered 63 Oscar nominations, 24 wins, and 9 Razzie nominations and 3 wins, and they include Dirty Dancing, Woody Allen’s Hanna and Her Sisters, Carlito’s Way starring Al Pacino and Sean Penn, Barbra Streisand’s The Prince of Tides, as well as a blessedly short stint on that cinematic catastrophe known as Ishtar. He has received two citations from The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for his contributions to both Children’s and Classical Programming. His entire filmography is available at IMDB.com, where in 1998 he was rated a statistical #1 and thereby considered to be one of the most influential filmmakers in the world. Inspired by the high jinks and slaphappy moments in his Academy Award winning 29th film, The Silence of the Lambs, Mark turned his hand to writing comic fiction. His debut piece, Saints Preserve Us!, appeared in The Battered Suitcase. That Engis County Affair, It Happened at Longhorn, the first 4 chapters of his novel The Girls, and numerous chapters of his up-coming full-length memoir have appeared in Audience Magazine. His short story, A Moment With Gramma, can be found in the anthology, Back In Five Minutes, published by Little Episodes, London. His work has also appeared in such diverse publications as Kerouac’s Dog Magazine (UK), WestWard Quarterly (US), The Stray Branch (US), Do Hookers Kiss? (UK), and Skive Magazine (AU.) Mark is thrilled to have his short story BRUISED published in GERTRUDE! Mark’s photographs have been exhibited in London and have appeared on the covers of both The Stray Branch and Westward Quarterly. In all Mark has over 85 pieces of prose, poetry, art, and photography in print. Mark is a graduate of The Goodman Theatre and School of Drama at The Art Institute of Chicago and Clown University. He is currently a member of the Confetti Dispersal Team for the annual New Year’s Celebration in New York’s Times Square. In 2014 Mark served as a member of The Super Bowl XLVIII Host Committee in New York City. In 2012 Mark was presented with a Poetic License by The General Association of Irregular Artists, which grants him the right to commit Acts of Peculiarity. He uses it quite often. Mark recently produced RATTLE, a short film by Andrew Pengilley about “Love, Death, and What We Leave Behind.” Shot in Bath, UK, it is currently in the submission process to film festivals around the world. Notorious Traits: Overbearing Perfectionist and Workaholic. Mark is currently looking for publisher for his memoir.
Introduce Yourself : Looking for a Publisher for my Show Biz Memoir by Mark Burchard
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Hi Mark - glad to have you in the Stage 32 community. So, let me get this straight...you did costuming for DIRTY DANCING? Did you chose Baby's iconic final dance dress? I'd love to know the story behind that. You've worked on so many great films & shows - SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, JFK, CARLITO'S WAY, SNL..do you have a favorite?
Julie! That dress! OMG! Hilary Rosenfeld, the designer, and I still get calls about that dress and where we bought it. HA! It was a custom made dress and only one was ever made. After each take in the finale I had to restitch dozens of pink beads back into place on a very patient Jennifer Grey—we shot that scene for the better part of a week—and they did hundreds of takes. You don't see them in the skirt but they are under the top layer of pink chiffon and they make the skirt iridescent. Favorite film? Its hard for me to make a choice because I always get the film making experience mixed up with the finished product. Many people have this same problem. So here is a quick list: Drama—BIRDY, Matthew Modine and Nick Cage. Comedy—Hannah and Her Sisters, Horror—Silence, Musical or Dance—The Cotton Club. Learning Experience—SNL. Every show had new problems and I learned to think out of the box and work very fast, which is something every aspiring filmmaker should learn to do. Thanks for your interest, Mark
You are officially my hero. Dirty Dancing was my favorite and I tried to make Jennifer Grey's final dance dress out of old sheets and blankets. I'd pause my VHS tape and try and see how/where the zipper was, and tried to figure out how that damn skirt would magically lift up effortlessly when JG moved around. That makes total sense as to how that chiffon magically sat a few cm above the rest of the skirt because of the beading and gave it the iridescent look! I cracked up at her sister's costume with the coconuts or whatever it was, too. You just made my day, Mark, you have no idea. Hannah and Her Sisters? I somehow completely missed that from your bio. That is one of my favorite Woody Allen films. You should post your work up on your Stage 32 profile so we can see it!
@Mark, perhaps you could search for publishing agents who handle memoirs.
Regina Lee, That is exactly what I've started doing. Thank You!
No worries. Best of luck!
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Julie, The dress had that lift because of the dozens of layers of silk chiffon used in the construction of the skirt. It really is beautiful. Hilary Rosenfeld designed it and it was just named as the 45th most iconic look of all time.
Hi, Mark. Re: the MEMOIR category -- you only need to search the sub-genre SHOW BIZ MEMOIRS. Also see if you can get a respected industry icon to agree to do the Forward (which you may have to script & the ICON merely takes credit for writing it). Too bad wonderful Jerry Orbach is gone. He would have done it in a flash. Good luck!!!