Mary Apick

Mary Apick is an award-winning Iranian actress, writer, and producer.

Apick was the first Iranian actress in the history of Iranian cinema to win the Best Actress Award from the Moscow International Film Festival. She won the award for her 1977 performance in Dead End, written and directed by Parviz Sayyad. She has been a human rights activist for three decades and actively strives through her plays to fight against the on-going brutality against women and children in Iran. Her extensive body of work projects the stories and the voices of Middle Eastern women today. She is a second-generation actress, writer, producer, and director. Her mother, Apick Youssefian, was a legendary actress in the pre-Islamic revolutionary Iranian film industry.

Apick began her career as a child performer in Iran. One of her earliest successes was in Octopus, a long-running, Saturday Night Live-type show on Iranian television, where Apick, starting at age ten, performed in political and satirical skits which helped change and liberalize the society. She eventually became a household name to millions of her countrymen and women. Prior to the Islamic revolution, Apick set fashion trends as a teen-ager with mini skirts and closely cropped hair. When the mullahs took power, however, they stamped out all symbols of the so-called cultural decadence symbolized by Apick. Apick was forced to flee her homeland and find a new home in America after the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Embracing her new home, Apick starred in several American productions, including the critically acclaimed The Mission and Checkpoint. She also played featured roles in productions such as the NBC miniseries On Wings of Eagles, and produced the MGM release Mind Games. Apick formed a successful working relationship with prolific filmmaker Bob Yari, one of the producers of the Academy Award-winning film Crash. With this partnership, Apick expanded her involvement in socially significant projects. Two such projects written by and starring Apick premiered at the 7th Annual Los Angeles Theater Festival. Both became critic’s choices and one, the politically charged Beneath the Veil, was slated for production in several other cities. The play offers audiences a glimpse behind the traditional veil worn by millions of Iranian women and illuminates the severe repression they endure. On opening night at Washington’s Kennedy Center, Apick delivered a passionate speech explaining the message of the play: "Beneath the Veil will expose to the viewers the significance of power of women who hold in their heart the love of humanity."

The culture of Iran is dear to Apick. She has created many projects for children, including the videos A Fairy Tale in the Forest and Jewel of The Night. These productions offer the children of Iranian expatriates an opportunity to appreciate their native culture and heritage. Improving conditions for women and children around the world, particularly in the Middle East, has been one of Apick’s abiding passions. When the 1980 Iran-Iraq war broke out, Apick focused her humanitarian efforts on illuminating the tragedy by creating a screenplay titled Stone Bird, which deals with children being forced to plant minefields.

Awards and honors

• Best Actress Award from Moscow International Film Festival 1977
• Arpa International Film Festival Humanatarian Award 2008

References

See also

• Iranian cinema
• List of famous Persian women

External links

• Interview with Mary Apick, Persian Mirror, 2004

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Name	Apick, Mary
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