Paul Hirsch

Biography

aul Hirsch (born November 14, 1945) is an American motion picture editor. A native of New York City, after graduating from Columbia he began to pursue a career in editing. In the late 1960s, while editing trailers in NYC, he was introduced by his brother, Charles, to then unknown filmmaker Brian De Palma. Their collaboration has yielded eleven feature films. In 1978, he won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for his work on Star Wars, along with Richard Chew and Marcia Lucas. He has edited over 35 feature films, including The Empire Strikes Back, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Mission: Impossible, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Footloose, Carrie, Falling Down, Phantom of the Paradise, Obsession, Blow Out, The Secret of My Success, Steel Magnolias and Ray, for which he received a second Academy Award nomination in 2005 and the American Cinema Editors' award for Best Edited Feature Film (Comedy or Musical). Hirsch rarely watches movies other than his own more than once. However, he cites that the musical "An American in Paris" and the science fiction film "2001: Space Odyssey" are worthy of repeat viewing (Slate, 2006, http://www.slate.com/id/2144555/). Coincidently, he has been nominated for an academy award for editing a musical (Ray) and won one for a science fiction film (Star Wars).