Pietro Scalia

Pietro Scalia (born March 17, 1960) is an Italian–American film editor. He won Best Film Editing at the 64th Academy Awards for his work on the film ''JFK'', sharing the award with Joe Hutshing, and at the 74th Academy Awards for '' Black Hawk Down''.

Life and career

He was born in Catania, Sicily and later he moved to Switzerland with his parents. There, he attended Swiss-German schools until high school. After graduation, he decided to move to the United States to pursue his college education. He spent two years at the University at Albany, The State University of New York, after which he was accepted as an undergraduate at UCLA. The Swiss government's scholarship helped him through five years of UCLA and in 1985 he earned his Master of Fine Arts from the UCLA Film School.

After his MFA, a couple of short films, a screenplay, two video documentaries, and a 16 mm thesis film, he returned to Europe to pursue his desire to become a film director. Shortly afterwards, he returned to United States on a work visa to pursue his career in Hollywood as a film editor. He began as an editor on Andrei Konchalovski's ''Shy People''. Later, he received an assistant editor position working with Oliver Stone. However, it was not easy to get the job. Scalia admired Oliver Stone's work, especially '' Salvador'', so he decided he wanted to work with that director. He got a contact through the sister of one of the assistant editors. Scalia worked on such films as ''Wall Street'' (1987) and ''Talk Radio'' (1988). He later continued as an associate editor on ''Born on the Fourth of July'' and as an additional editor on ''The Doors''.

After five years of working with Oliver Stone, Scalia was finally asked to fully edit a film. It was ''JFK'', for which Scalia and his co-editor, Joe Hutshing, were honored with an Academy Award for Film Editing. Craig McKay was nominated the same year for editing '' The Silence of the Lambs''. Scalia edited a sequel to the movie, ''Hannibal'' ten years later. He also received a BAFTA Award and A.C.E. Award for his work.

Pietro Scalia worked with Bernardo Bertolucci on ''Little Buddha'' (1993) and ''Stealing Beauty'' (1996), as well as with Sam Raimi on '' The Quick and the Dead'' (1995). He earned two more Academy Award nominations: first in 1997 for ''Good Will Hunting'' and second in 2000 for ''Gladiator'', and a second Academy Award for director Ridley Scott's '' Black Hawk Down''. He also edited ''G.I. Jane'' and a pilot episode of a TV series '' American Gothic'' in late 1990s.

In the recent years, Scalia edited such movies as ''Levity'' (2003) directed by Ed Solomon, a documentary entitled ''Ashes and Snow'', ''The Great Raid'' directed by John Dahl, and ''Memoirs of a Geisha'', one of the most publicized movies of 2005, directed by Rob Marshall. Scalia also worked on ''Hannibal Rising'', a movie that tells a story of a teenaged Hannibal and his young sister Mischa Lecter after their parents are killed in World War II. It was directed by Peter Webber and released in 2006. He has a long lasting relationship with Ridley Scott working on movies such as '' American Gangster'' in 2007, '' Body of Lies'' in 2008 and ''Robin Hood'' in 2010. Most recently he worked with director Ridley Scott on '' The Martian'', released in October 2015. In May 2017, Scalia replaced editor Chris Dickens on the film '' Solo: A Star Wars Story'', which was released in May 2018.

He lives in Los Angeles with his wife Teresa Sparks and two children, Julian and Maia Scalia.

Filmography

As film editor:

* 1990 ''Megaville''
* 1991 ''JFK''
* 1992 ''Jackpot''
* 1993 ''Little Buddha''
* 1995 '' The Quick and the Dead''
* 1995 '' American Gothic'' (TV pilot, first cut)
* 1996 ''Stealing Beauty''
* 1997 ''G.I. Jane''
* 1997 ''Good Will Hunting''
* 1998 ''The Big Hit''
* 1998 ''Playing by Heart''
* 2000 ''Gladiator''
* 2001 ''Hannibal''
* 2001 '' Black Hawk Down''
* 2003 '' Levity''
* 2003 ''Masked and Anonymous''
* 2005 ''Ashes and Snow''
* 2005 ''The Great Raid''
* 2005 ''Memoirs of a Geisha''
* 2007 '' American Gangster''
* 2007 ''Hannibal Rising''
* 2007 '' The 11th Hour''
* 2008 '' Body of Lies''
* 2009 '' 40 Years of Silence: An Indonesian Tragedy''
* 2010 ''Robin Hood''
* 2010 '' Kick-Ass''
* 2012 ''The Amazing Spider-Man''
* 2012 ''Prometheus''
* 2013 ''The Counselor''
* 2014 ''The Amazing Spider-Man 2''
* 2015 ''Child 44''
* 2015 '' The Sea of Trees''
* 2015 '' The Martian''
* 2016 '' 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi''
* 2017 '' Alien: Covenant''
* 2018 '' Solo: A Star Wars Story''
* 2022 '' Morbius'' (Also associate producer)
* 2022 ''Ambulance''
* 2022 ''The Gray Man''
* 2023 ''Ferrari''

Oscars and Oscar nominations

*1992 – ''JFK'' (won w/ co-editor, Joe Hutshing)
*1998 – ''Good Will Hunting'' (nominated)
*2001 – ''Gladiator'' (nominated)
*2002 – '' Black Hawk Down'' (won)

References

External links

*
Filmed BAFTA event with Pietro Scala
July 2009

{{DEFAULTSORT:Scalia, Pietro
1960 births
Film people from Catania
American Cinema Editors
Best Editing BAFTA Award winners
Best Film Editing Academy Award winners
Italian film editors
Living people
Italian emigrants to the United States
American film editors