Mark Shostrom

Born in 1956, Mark grew up in Hong Kong during the 1970s. He became interested in makeup after seeing The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) starring Boris Karloff. In Hong Kong, Mark became friends with Karloff's widow Evelyn, who encouraged him to pursue makeup. He corresponded with John Chambers, makeup designer for Planet of the Apes (1968) from 1975 to 1977. After moving to L.A., Chambers gave Mark his first contacts in the film business. He began his career in movies creating a scar makeup on Didi Conn for the Academy Award winning Best Short Film Violet (1982) and as a lab assistant to Rick Baker on Videodrome (1983). Mark opened his own studio in 1985, designing and creating special makeup effects for numerous cult films of the 80s such as Evil Dead II (1987),A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985),A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987),From Beyond (1986) and Phantasm II (1988). He was a staff sculptor and makeup creator for Michael Westmore on Star Trek: Voyager (1995) for three years. Turning to screenwriting, Mark's first script climbed to the top 1% of the Academy Awards' Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting competition. He has been a semifinalist or quarterfinalist in the Nicholl two other times, most recently in 2013. Three of Mark's scripts became Second Rounders in the Austin Film Festival's 2016 Screenplay Competition. He is one of only five writers in the 26-year history of the festival to do this in one year with three screenplays. Speaks decent Mandarin; reads and writes Chinese (both Traditional and Simplified).