Scott Conrad(I)

Scott Conrad, the Academy Award-winning film editor (Rocky), began his career in 1964 at 20th Century Fox. Twenty years old at the time, he worked his way up from the mail room. In his search to discover his niche in the studio, he worked for a short time in the Publicity Department covering such films as The Sound of Music and Goodbye, Charlie. The more he learned about the craft of film making, the more he was drawn to film editing. Many of the producers and directors such as Frank Schaffner, Vincente Minelli and Robert Wise encouraged Conrad, explaining that editing was the key to good film making.

Robert Mintz, who was the head of TV Post Production, gave Conrad his opportunity. At that time the Film Editors Union was a closed union membership was coveted and very limited. In the previous five years, only 3 new members had been accepted. It was a Catch 22 situation, said Conrad. In order to be accepted into the Editors Guild, you had to have a job as an editor and in order to have a job as an editor, you had to be in the union. In September of 1964, Robert Mintz told Conrad that he would hire him on a temporary basis and that if he were to remain employed for ninety days, the Editors Guild would accept him.

Soon the temporary job became a permanent job and Conrad was accepted into the Editors Guild. However, according to Conrad, You first served as an apprentice and when you were lucky enough to get the opportunity, you moved up to assistant editor. But at that time, you had to be in the Guild for a minimum of eight years before you could become an editor.

After working as an apprentice and assistant for two years, Conrad became impatient waiting for the opportunity to actually cut a film of his own. In 1966 he returned to college to complete his education, this time majoring in Cinema at the University of Southern California. While at USC he was mentored by some of the legendary professors of the Cinema School such as Bernie Kantor and Herb Farmer and exchanged ideas with fellow students John Milius and George Lucas.

While working on his senior project, Conrad who had been working part time at 20th Century Fox to pay for his tuition, was offered an opportunity which he couldn't turn down. The Film Editor on Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid was fired by director George Roy Hill. The assistant editor, John Howard, was given the job of editor and in turn asked Conrad to move up from apprentice to assistant editor. Needless to say, even though it meant dropping out of USC, he accepted.

George Roy Hills assistant on Butch Cassidy was Ron Preisman, a close friend of Conrad. While on location in Colorado, Preisman asked Hill if he could use Hills 16mm Bolex to shoot a few of the background scenes, such as the trains safe being blown up. Conrad and Preisman began collaborating on what other scenes they could film and came up with the idea of doing a behind the scenes documentary. Cinematographer Conrad Hall taught Preisman how to use the camera and the footage improved. Conrad asked the studio for a 16mm Moviola and stayed late at night playing with the footage and shaping it into a film. That project became The Making of Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid and won an Emmy for Best Documentary.

With the success of the Butch Cassidy documentary came what could have been an end to Conrads career as a film editor. He had violated the sacrosanct eight year rule and was brought before the Editors Guild Board to explain why he should not be expelled from the union. Fortunately Conrad was able to persuade the Board that he had begun the project merely as an educational experiment and had no idea that it would become a full-fledged film, garnering such an award.

The Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid documentary launched Conrads career as an editor and in 1972 he was finally able to attain recognized status as a Film Editor. At first he worked as an Associate Editor under the legendary editors Lou Lombardo (The Wild Bunch) and Danford Greene (M.A.S.H). Subsequently he was the sole editor on some low-budget films such as The Messiah of Evil. In 1974 he teamed up with director-actor-producer L.Q.Jones to edit A Boy & His Dog. That film was not only a success at the time it was released, but has gone on to become a cult favorite and is still played in art house theaters.

Finally, in 1976 Conrad was given the opportunity he had been looking for when fellow editor Richard Halsey asked Scott to help him edit Rocky. Their collaboration resulted in an Academy Award for Best Film Editing and his career took off.

He currently lives in Nashville with his wife Aissa Wayne Conrad.