Antonioni sought an authentic counterculture figure as his American Che

Evidence

After two years of pre-release publicity, the film had its world premiere at a Third Avenue arthouse, the Coronet Theater. Antonioni, who hoped to open with footage of a real race riot, twice crossed the United States in late 1967 and through the summer of 1968, scouting locations and meeting counterculture celebrities. Dancer Anna Halprin’s eighteen-year-old daughter Daria was cast in the lead, but production was postponed while Antonioni searched for an appropriate co-star, whom he imagined as an American Che. In June, the director held an open casting call at the Electric Circus. Eventually, he chose Mark Frechette, an angry yet inexpressive young carpenter from Mel Lyman’s commune in Fort Hill, Boston. — J. Hoberman, Everything Is Now, 1549

Categorization

• XREF: Antonioni’s search for authentic counterculture performers to make a real riot parallels the reader’s interest in how avant-garde scenes become markets — the mainstream Hollywood apparatus importing counterculture authenticity.