Deconstructing Dad—The Music, Machines and Mystery of Raymond Scott

Biography--Filmmaker-Stan Warnow (Producer, Director, Cinematographer and Editor)

Stan Warnow received his B.A. from the University of Rochester and after graduating from the NYU School of the Arts cinema program with a Master of Fine Arts began working in New York City both as a cinematographer and editor on documentaries and dramatic films, and has worked in both genres for his whole career. His first feature editing credit was on The Honeymoon Killers, a low budget film noir that went on to be named to the New York Times 10 best list of 1969, as well as becoming a huge European hit--Francois Truffaut at one point referred to it as "his favorite American film."

His next major project, as a cameraman and editor was the 1970 Academy Award winning and editing nominated feature documentary Woodstock. He was an editor on many music based projects throughout the 70's including the feature film Hair and the concert documentary No Nukes. He was also an editor on Ragtime. In 1982 he co-directed, co-produced, and supervised the editing of the award winning documentary feature In Our Hands, the film chronicle of the massive June 12, 1982 New York rally against nuclear weapons and energy. The film was a massive all volunteer effort, and included the participation of Pete Seeger, James Taylor, Peter Paul and Mary, and Meryl Streep, and behind the camera luminaries such as Barbara Kopple, Robert Leacock and Buddy Squires.

In 1984 he edited the Warner Brothers production of Sesame Street's Follow That Bird. During the early eighties he also worked frequently on many film segments for Saturday Night Live. Later in the eighties he spent a year in Los Angeles during which he edited the PBS series Tales from the Hollywood Hills, the feature Beyond the Stars and several episodes of The Wonder Years series. Back in New York he edited. two network televison movies and Vaclav Havel's Largo Desolato, a PBS Great Performances version of the Czech playwright-president's stage play. This was followed in 1991 by another PBS project, working with Jane Alexander and her husband, director Ed Sherin, editing their American Playhouse biographical drama, O'Keeffe and Stieglitz, A Marriage.

In 1995 he returned to music documentary, as an editor on Message to Love for the BBC, a long delayed film about the 1970 Isle of Wight Music festival, often referred to as Britain's Woodstock. It was produced and directed by Academy Award winner Murray Lerner. Then came the dramatic feature No Way Home, followed in 1997 by another feature, Under Hellgate Bridge. Later in 1997 he co-edited the Emmy nominated PBS documentary The Trial of Adolf Eichmann, produced by Great Projects. Then in 1998 he was editor on Working Shakespeare, a documentary chronicle of an acting workshop that brought together notable US and British actors, including Helen Hunt, Claire Danes, Samuel Jackson and others, for an intense immersion in Shakespearean acting and vocal techniques. In 1999 he worked on the PBS series Media Matters, and in 2000 was busy with Michael Moore's series The Awful Truth, as well as Building Boston for PBS, the political and engineering story behind the Big Dig, the biggest urban public works project in history. In 2001 he edited Real Boys for MSNBC followed by Music From the Inside Out, the critically acclaimed and theatrically distributed feature documentary for PBS featuring members of the Philadelphia Orchestra. More recently he edited Rittenhouse Square, the music filled feature documentary directed by Robert Downey, Sr., set in the famous Philadelphia park. His most recent editing job prior to his current full time work on the Raymond Scott project was on La Maestra In the House, a documentary portrait of the Buffalo based violinist and conductor Mary Louise Nanna, produced and directed by Julia D’Amico. Stan Warnow graduated from the NYU School of the Arts cinema program with a Master of Fine Arts and began working in New York City both as a cinematographer and editor on documentaries and dramatic films, and has worked in both genres for his whole career. He produced and directed the award winning 1983 feature documentary In Our Hands and has been an editor on many historic music films including Woodstock. His feature film editing credits include cult classic The Honeymoon Killers, Hair and Ragtime.