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MARC DIDDEN

The Belgian film maker and actor Marc Didden was born in 1949. Most of his life he has lived and worked in Brussels where he also studied Film Direction and Playwriting. From 1973, after a long stay in New York, he became journalist for several Belgian and Dutch publications, specializing in in-depth interviews with people as diverse as Bob Marley, Mel Brooks, Bruce Springsteen or Martin Scorsese.

In 1980 he wrote his first TV-screenplay, "The 15 Million Man". The same year his first film script, "Brussels By Night", was awarded the state prize for "Best Screenplay" and two theatres, one in Brussels one in Amsterdam, presented his first play, "Re-make/Re-Model", based on Jean-Luc Godard's "Pierrot Le Fou".

In late 1982 Marc Didden decided to direct his debut film, based on the earlier scenario "Brussels By Night". In 1983 this film won seven awards, including first prize in the category of "Nuevos Realizadores" at the San Sebastian Film Festival.
In 1984 Didden wrote and directed his second feature, "Istanbul" followed by a third film in 1988, "Sailors Don't Cry".

The same year he also acted in two features "Oh Boy", by Orlow Seunke and "The Sacrament", by Hugo Claus, which was selected for the Cannes Festival the next year. In 1992 Marc Didden made a fourth feature, "A Man Needs A Plan".

Since then Marc Didden has mainly worked at screenwriting, for example "Hombres Complicados" for Dominique Deruddere, script-doctoring, and teaching at the Sint Lukas Hogeschool in Brussels. He is also a member of the Board at the "Cinémathéque Royale de Belgique", of the Belgian Director's Guild, and of the "Palais Des Beaux Arts" in Brussels.



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