January 17, 1939 – December 29, 2024
pIcture editor George Forsey (Jr).
As photographer George J. demanded. Taking advantage of industry changes, Folsey collaborated with enterprising young director John Landis. Together, the two have shaped the sharpest, smoothest, most shaped comedy in modern times, while Forsey plays a variety of roles. He has served as editor, co-editor or producer for every Landis work from “Schlock” (1973) to “Cometing America” (1988), which includes highlights such as “National Lampoon’s Animal House” (1978) and “Blues Brothers” (1980), Folsey edited and produced “American Werewolf in London” (1981) and ” FORSE (1981) and “Trade” (1983).
“My father is definitely an occasional time,” said his son, image editor Ryan Folsey, who spoke about his father’s unique partnership with Landis. “Nothing really shocked him. He was a political genius and I think John knew everything my dad told him might be in the right direction. They really just worked hard on each other.”
Folsey died of pneumonia on December 29 at the age of 85. Although his health has become worse in recent months, the senior editor is far from retirement. “You have to pry him off from his desk at home,” said Ryan Folsey. “He is still working on the performance, cutting and consulting until the end. It’s amazing. He really likes it.”
George was born in Los Angeles, and George J. studied engineering and physics at Pomona College. “Like his mom, he was really good at math.” After graduation, he started working in the editorial department of the news department on KABC-TV, at least that’s different from his father’s background in the camera department of countless feature films. It turns out that the “technology” problem-solving side of the post-production attracted him. “He was definitely more involved in engineering and career routes,” says Ryan Folsey. “In those days, you looked at Kems and Moviolas and the way editorials were done, it had such a mechanical process, and he really flourished.”
After taking office at MGM, Folsey established himself with his independent function. He served as co-editor (and his father, photographer) for Larry Cohen’s Bone (1972), and has produced several Blaxploitation films, including Cohen’s Black Caesar (1973). Then there is “Schlock”, his first film with Landis. “I believe John is a little younger than my dad,” Ryan Forsey said. “So it might be nice that he has someone who has built himself in the industry – Landis could seek advice but keeps making John John.”
As Ryan Folsey put it, his father’s hub from being an editor and producer of Landis films to being a producer and all-around creative collaborator was a logical evolution. “He might be like, ‘Hey, I kind of produce some of these things.”[As an editor]you sit here every day and are dealing with vendors and are dealing with sound and music. I think he progresses naturally with this vein. Even in those Landis films produced but not edited by Folsey, he worked closely with Ace’s editor Malcolm Campbell and was involved in the final film.
In 1987, Folsey was acquitted by a scene helicopter accident in 1983’s “Twilight: The Movie” (Folsey on the Folsey is the associate producer). During production in July 1982, Vic Morrow and two child actors died after the scene demanded that the explosives cause the helicopter crash. Landis and others who worked on the film were also acquitted in the same trial.
Ryan Forsey said his father was troubled by the “Twilight Zone” accident. He said: “No one would want to go through something like this – it’s devastating.
When his collaboration with Landis came to the conclusion with the conclusion of “coming to America” and Forsey was co-edited and produced with Campbell, his career still compromised his chosen projects and his chosen roles. As an executive producer, Folsey’s films included Peter Bogdanovich’s “The Thing Called Love” (1993) and Jonathan Lynn’s “Greedy” (1994), and he continued to edit or co-edit features, big, small, and in-between, including John McTiernan’s “Basic” (2003), Eli Roth’s “Hostel” (2005), the “Pink Panther” remake starring Steve Martin (2006) and Steve Pink Pink’s “Hot Tub Time Machine” (2010). He is proud of his ability to save projects, and he tries to alleviate tensions that may develop between cutting rooms or studio executives and creatives. “He has such a natural ability to make everyone belong to a project on the same page,” said Ryan Folsey.
Looking back on his career, Folsey may be proud of the “Bruce Brothers” because of the complexity of editing musical numbers on Kem. Ryan Forsey also proudly noted that the “trading place” produced by his father was completed in record time after major photography. “Can others solve this problem with the studio during this time and do a good job?” he said.
In addition to Ryan, Forsey is survived by his wife Belinda, daughter Erin and their grandchildren Lucia, Chloe and Hazel.
– Peter Tonguette
