Thelma Schoonmaker (; born January 3, 1940) is an American film editor, best known for her collaboration over five decades with director Martin Scorsese. She has received numerous accolades, including three Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards, and four ACE Eddie Awards. She has been honored with the British Film Institute Fellowship in 1997, the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2014, and the BAFTA Fellowship in 2019.
Schoonmaker started working with Scorsese on his debut feature film, Who's That Knocking at My Door (1967), and has edited all of his films since Raging Bull (1980). She has received a record nine nominations for the Academy Award for Best Film Editing and has won a record three times for Raging Bull, The Aviator (2004), and The Departed (2006). She has also been nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Editing a record 11 times, winning twice for Raging Bull and Goodfellas (1990).
Early life Thelma Schoonmaker was born on January 3, 1940, in Algiers (then part of French Algeria), the daughter of American parents, Thelma and Bertram Schoonmaker. Bertram, descended from the New York Dutch Schoonmaker political family, was employed as an agent of the Standard Oil Company and worked extensively abroad. The Schoonmakers were evacuated to the United States shortly after the Fall of France during the Second World War. In 1941, the family moved to the Dutch-Caribbean island of Aruba, where Schoonmaker's father continued to work for Standard Oil and her mother ran nursery schools. Schoonmaker was primarily raised in Aruba, in a community she described as "a colony of expatriates from over the world"; she also spent part of her childhood in Portugal.
Schoonmaker did not live in the United States until she was an adolescent in 1955, and was initially alienated and dumbfounded by American culture. She settled in Ridgewood, New Jersey,Presinzano, Jessica. "Celebrities, politicians and athletes who call North Jersey home", The Record, October 11, 2017. Accessed December 21, 2023. "Famed musician Nelson Riddle went to Ridgewood High and Oscar-winning film editor Thelma Schoonmaker called the village home." and graduated in 1957 from Ridgewood High School.Herzog, Laura. "Alumnus joins a 'distinguished' group", The Ridgewood News, October 12, 2012. Accessed December 21, 2023, via Newspapers.com. "There is Thelma Schoonmaker (Class of 1957), a Hollywood film editor who has won three Academy Awards for her work on Raging Bull, The Aviator and The Departed." Schoonmaker was interested in a career in international diplomacy and began attending Cornell University in 1957, where she studied political science and the Russian language. When she graduated from Cornell in 1961, she began taking State Department tests in order to apply for positions within the U.S. government.Daniel Aloi, "Thelma Schoonmaker '61 to talk movies Nov. 19 at Cornell", cornell.edu; accessed February 26, 2018. Politically inclined and opinionated, Schoonmaker was opposed to the Vietnam War and supported the civil rights movement. She passed the State Department exams but failed the final "stress test" when she expressed distaste for the South African policy of apartheid, a stance which did not sit well with those administering the tests. Schoonmaker later said that the State Department had turned her down for being "too politically liberal" and she joked that they had said that "you’re not going to be happy here".[ claimed] that her views were "too politically liberal" and that she wouldn't be happy having a job at the Department.
Career
While taking a graduate course in primitive art at Columbia University, Schoonmaker saw an advertisement in The New York Times that offered training as an assistant film editor.Thelma Schoonmaker Profile, Turner Classic Movies Film Article; retrieved February 5, 2013. She responded to the advertisement and got the job. The job entailed assisting an "editor" who was randomly cutting frames from classic European films (such as those by Truffaut, Godard and Fellini), so that their length would conform to the running times of U.S. television broadcasts.
She signed up for a brief six-week course in filmmaking at New York University, where she came into contact with young Martin Scorsese, who was struggling to complete his short film What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?. A negative cutter had butchered the film, not leaving enough negative frames to allow for hot splicing, so a film professor asked Schoonmaker to help Scorsese. Schoonmaker went on to edit Scorsese's feature directorial debut, Who's That Knocking at My Door (1967).
Schoonmaker received her first major screen credits when she and Scorsese both became part of the editing team on Michael Wadleigh's seminal music festival documentary, 1970's Woodstock. She received an Oscar nomination for Best Film Editing for her groundbreaking work—the first documentary ever to be nominated in that category. Her use of superimpositions and freeze frames brought the performances in the film to life and added to the movie's broad appeal, thus helping to raise the artistry and visibility of documentary film-making to a new level.
The early period of Schoonmaker's career was difficult. Despite being an Oscar nominee, Schoonmaker could not work on feature films unless she became a member of the Motion Picture Editors Guild. The union's entry requirements included spending five years as an apprentice and three as an assistant, which Schoonmaker was unwilling to meet. Schoonmaker remarked, "And I just couldn't see why I, who had been a full editor and had been nominated for an Academy Award, should suddenly have to become an apprentice. ...And of course, they couldn't see the sense of why I, who had never been in the union all those years and had never paid dues all those years and had never served my time in their sense, should be allowed as a full editor. So it was quite understandable on both sides. It was just insane."
Consequently, Schoonmaker did not work with Scorsese in a formal capacity in the 1970s; however, she did make an uncredited contribution to Taxi Driver. Scorsese had decided not to edit the picture during principal photography, but to save all the editing until shooting had wrapped. Unfortunately, this left him very little time to cut the picture, as Columbia's contract stipulated that a finished cut had to be supplied by the middle of February. Scorsese brought in Schoonmaker to help. At one point, Steven Spielberg visited Scorsese and chipped in with some contributions toward the final edit.
In the 1980s, Schoonmaker, with some help from Scorsese, was eventually accepted into the union. They worked together on the classic sports drama Raging Bull, which is widely considered masterful editing and won her the Best Film Editing Oscar. During her acceptance speech for the film, Schoonmaker said "I want to thank, first of all, Marty Scorsese; he edited this film with me every minute of the time. I want to thank him particularly for his brilliant direction, and Robert De Niro for his incredible performance which gave me gold to work with — pure gold."
Personal life
She was introduced to Michael Powell by Scorsese and London-based film producer Frixos Constantine. The couple were married from May 19, 1984, until his death in 1990. The couple had no children.Chris Tilly, "Thelma Schoonmaker Q&A" , TimeOut.com, September 26, 2005. She has cited Buddhist concepts, particularly the mandala—the creation and dissolution of an artwork—as an influence on her work.
Since Powell's death, Schoonmaker has dedicated herself to preserving the films and honoring the legacy of her husband, who directed many classic films with his partner, Emeric Pressburger. In an interview with A.Frame asking Schoonmaker what her five favorite films of all time are, she listed two of their films, The Red Shoes and The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. (The others were Faces, The Flowers of St. Francis and Raging Bull).
Filmography Film YearTitleDirector(s)Notes1967Who's That Knocking at My DoorMartin Scorsese1968The Virgin PresidentGraeme FergusonCo-edited with Mark Rappaport and Burt Rashby 1970WoodstockMichael WadleighDocumentaryAssistant director & editorCo-edited with Michael Wadleigh, Martin Scorsese, Stan Warnow, Yeu-Bun Yee, and Jere HugginsStreet Scenes 1970Martin ScorseseDocumentary short film1979The Kids Are AlrightJeff SteinRockumentarySpecial consultant1980Raging BullMartin Scorsese1982The King of Comedy1985After Hours1986The Color of Money1987Michael Jackson: BadShort film and music video by Michael Jackson1988The Last Temptation of Christ1989New York StoriesSegment: "Life Lessons"1990Made in MilanDocumentary short film Goodfellas1991Cape Fear1993The Age of Innocence1995A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American MoviesMartin ScorseseMichael Henry WilsonDocumentarySupervising editorCasinoMartin Scorsese1996Grace of My HeartAllison AndersCo-edited with James Y. Kwei and Harvey Rosenstock1997KundunMartin Scorsese1999My Voyage to ItalyDocumentaryBringing Out the Dead2002Gangs of New York2004The Aviator2006The Departed2007The Key to ReservaShort film and long-form advertisement for Freixenet2010Shutter Island2011Hugo2013The Wolf of Wall Street2014Learning to DriveIsabel CoixetCo-edited with Keith Reamer2015Bombay VelvetAnurag KashyapCo-edited with Prerna Saigal2016Letters from BaghdadSabine KrayenbühlZeva OelbaumDocumentaryExecutive producerSilenceMartin Scorsese2017The SnowmanTomas AlfredsonCo-edited with Claire Simpson2019The IrishmanMartin Scorsese2023Killers of the Flower Moon 2024Made in England: The Films of Powell and PressburgerDavid Hinton DocumentaryExecutive producerTBAWhat Happens at NightMartin Scorsese
Television YearTitleNotes1979Wings Over the WorldTelevision documentaryCo-edited with Robin Clarke and Paul Stein2003AFI Life Achievement Award: A Tribute to Robert De NiroTelevision specialCo-edited with Debra Light, Adam "Chip" Pauken, Mike Polito, Ryan Polito, Martin Scorsese, and Yoram Inon Tal2010Boardwalk EmpireConsultant; Episode: "Boardwalk Empire"2020The Right StuffConsulting producer; 2 episodes
Achievements and recognition Schoonmaker equaled the record for the most Oscar wins (three) in the Best Film Editing category, shared with Ralph Dawson, Daniel Mandell, and Michael Kahn. Furthermore, she holds the record for most nominations in that category, with nine. Schoonmaker is also the first woman to win multiple Oscars for film editing.
In 2012, on the 75th anniversary of its founding, the Motion Picture Editors Guild issued a list of the 75 best-edited films of all time based on a survey of its membership. Three films edited by Schoonmaker made the list—all directed by Scorsese and spanning three different decades—including Raging Bull (1980), which is ranked first; Goodfellas (1990), ranked fifteenth; and Hugo (2011), ranked sixty-ninth. Only George Tomasini, the editor of Alfred Hitchcock's films in the 1950s and 1960s, has more appearances on this list, with four; and only Dede Allen also edited three pictures across three decades, with hers in particular from the 1960s through the 1980s.
Awards and nominations Major associations Academy Awards Year Category Nominated work Result Ref. 1971 Best Film Editing Woodstock 1981 Raging Bull 1991 Goodfellas 2003 Gangs of New York 2005 The Aviator 2007 The Departed 2012 Hugo 2020 The Irishman 2024 Killers of the Flower Moon
BAFTA Awards Year Category Nominated work Result Ref.British Academy Film Awards 1982 Best Editing Raging Bull 1984 The King of Comedy 1991 Goodfellas 1993 Cape Fear 2003 Gangs of New York 2005 The Aviator 2007 The Departed 2012 Hugo 2014 The Wolf of Wall Street 2020 The Irishman 2024 Killers of the Flower Moon
Emmy Awards Year Category Nominated work Result Ref.Primetime Emmy Awards 2004 Outstanding Picture Editing for Variety Programming AFI Life Achievement Award: A Tribute to Robert De Niro