The title Mean Streets comes from a quote from Raymond Chandler “But down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid.”  

Evidently, Scorsese sent the script to Corman who suggested using African American actors but director John Cassavetes had told him that he had “spent a year of his life making a piece of shit” for Corman on Boxcar Bertha. 

-Rose Kuo, Film Society of Lincoln Center

Scorsese described the genesis of “Mean Streets” as “pretty much a counterbalance to ‘Who’s That Knocking’. To a certain extent, ‘Mean Streets’ is closer to the reality of what was going on.” Finding financing wasn’t easy - the director related the now-famous story of Corman pitching him on an all-black version of “Mean Streets.” “I said, ‘Ok, I’ll think about it.’ You never say no. As I walked out, I said, ‘I can’t, no it’s just not gonna work.’ ”

Shooting in New York for more than a few days was out of their budget, so Scorsese and crew tracked down the most New York-esque places they could find — in Los Angeles. “The interiors had to have some aspect of New York,” Scorsese explained. Shooting around Little Italy proved difficult, since most people in the neighborhood weren’t open to having cameras around. “My father had to talk to a lot of people, pay some money to people in buildings, and he was quite upset about it, but they weren’t very forthcoming.” The shoot lasted twenty six days. “Basically it was all designed, for one shot to go to the next, to create the impression of New York.”

Martin Scorsese Talks About Growing Up On Some Mean Streets in New York’s Lincoln Center

To get his 1967 debut Who’s That Knocking at My Door distributed by an exploitation mogul, Scorsese had to add a nude scene shot in Amsterdam.

“Harvey [Keitel]’s having a good time…I was probably the only one who wasn’t sexually liberated. I had to edit it in Amsterdam. And I put it in my raincoat and got it through customs.”

Conversations with Scorsese, Richard Schickel (via Hollywood Reporter).

THE A-Z OF MARTIN SCORSESE

G - GENNARO, SAN

The Feast of San Gennaro is the bustling Little Italy centrepiece of Mean Streets. It’s an annual carnival in the largely Italian district - ten or so blocks transformed into an annual fair of bandstands and chow stalls - and Scorsese knew it well from his time living in the district while at NYU. Mean Streets is a semi-biopic of the young filmmaker in which he’s surrogated by Harvey Keitel, whose aspiring wiseguy Charlie spends three days and nights creeping Elizabeth and Mulberry Streets attempting to wrap his noggin around big questions of faith, loyalty and the meaning of the word ‘mook’. “Anyone who saw Mean Streets got a good sense of what it was like to live in an Italian/American community up to that time (1973),” explains Scorsese, whose own, not-entirely-successful time at a Catholic seminary was never quite as tortured as his on-screen alter ego.

Empire Online

lobbycards:

Mean Streets, Spanish lobby card. 1973

thegoodfilms:

Mean Streets (1973)

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manusfez:

Criterion Cover for Scorsese’s “Mean Streets”

(Source: midmarauder, via fromthemindofsergioramirez)

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Mean Streets

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leviperetic:

Whose eyebrows do I see hiding in the back seat with a gun?

(Source: palmhardy, via fuckyeahnewhollywood)