LOS ANGELES — The Hollywood Post Alliance will present its highest honor to Alan Heim, ACE, and Randy Roberts, ACE, at the 9th Annual HPA Awards Show on November 6th. Each will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award for their contributions to the field of post production.
Alan Heim is a native New Yorker whose credits and awards span feature films and television. Early in his career, he worked on many television shows as a sound editor, eventually working with Sidney Lumet on a number of films, including The Pawnbroker and The Group, and with Mel Brooks on the original version of The Producers. He also worked as a music editor on Paul Newman's Rachel, Rachel.
He then became a picture editor and edited The Sea Gull for Lumet, The Twelve Chairs with Brooks, and many other projects, including Godspell, She's Having a Baby and Funny Farm. Heim won an Emmy for Liza With a Z, directed by Bob Fosse. That was the beginning of a collaboration that spanned three films: Lenny, All That Jazz and Star 80. Heim won an Oscar, BAFTA, and ACE Eddie Award for All That Jazz. He also edited Network for Lumet, for which he was again nominated for an Oscar.
Heim moved to Los Angeles in 1994, where he worked on American History X, The Notebook and Alpha Dog. In addition, Heim won an Emmy for editing the miniseries Holocaust, and was nominated for Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, and Grey Gardens. He is currently President of both ACE and the Motion Picture Editors Guild.
Randy Roberts, ACE, has served the American Cinema Editors tirelessly for nearly two decades; as a member of the board of directors since 1996, as vice president from 2005 to 2008, as president from 2008-2012, and currently as the organization’s director of marketing. Roberts is one of the originators of EditFest, a global series of editing festivals that highlight the art and business of film editing. He helped to implement ACE Tech Day to help ensure that the organization’s membership remain at the top of their field in technology.
Born into the entertainment industry in Burbank, CA, Roberts began his career in front of the camera with a number of roles in movies, TV shows and commercials during his youth. Eventually, he worked his way into the film editing department at Warner Bros. and an apprenticeship with the union. His first feature film editing credit was on Richard Pryor’s Greased Lightning, followed by projects with Francis Ford Coppola (One from the Heart), Robert Evans (Players), David E. Kelley and Dick Wolf. In addition to his motion picture and television editing credits, which include Chicago Hope, LA Law, The Agency and Tour of Duty, Roberts’ career has also included directing a number of episodes of network television, but his first love remained the cutting room. He spent the last decade working as supervising producer on the long-running hit series Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.
He is an ACE Eddie Award winner and nominee, a Primetime Emmy Award nominee, and the recipient of the American Cinema Editors’ Heritage Award.
In addition to the Lifetime Achievement honors, winners in 12 craft categories, special awards for Creativity and Innovation, and the Engineering Excellence Award will be bestowed at the HPA Awards (www.hpaonline.com) gala on November 6th.