Carl Lerner
{{Short description|American film editor, director and educator (1912–1973)}}
Carl Lerner (17 June 1912 – 26 August 1973) was an American film editor, director and educator whose career bridged New York's post‑war documentary movement and Hollywood's studio and independent features, earning recognition for his editorial work on 12 Angry Men (1957) and for directing the civil‑rights drama Black Like Me (1964).{{cite web |url=https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/person/112330 |title=Carl Lerner – Overview |website=Turner Classic Movies |access-date=12 May 2025}}
Early life and education
Lerner was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 17 June 1912 to Russian‑Jewish immigrant parents.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qsEvAQAAIAAJ |title=ACE First Decade Anniversary Book |publisher=American Cinema Editors |year=1961 |page=127}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1973/08/28/archives/carl-lerner-61-the-film-editor-of-klute-12-angry-men-dies.html|title=Carl Lerner, 61, the Film Editor Of ‘Klute,’ ‘12 Angry Men,’ Dies|date=August 28, 1973|via=NYTimes.com}} He earned a degree in theatre arts at Temple University in the early 1930s, where he also staged student productions.{{cite web |url=https://www.moma.org/pdfs/docs/learn/filmstudycenter/Carl_Lerner_Collection_MoMA.pdf |title=Carl Lerner Collection finding aid |website=Museum of Modern Art |access-date=12 May 2025}} After acting with Philadelphia and New York repertory companies, he moved behind the scenes as a stage director before entering film in the late 1940s.{{cite web |url=https://cinemontage.org/run-demillered-scare-blacklist-directorial-feud/ |title=Run of DeMille: Red Scare, Blacklist and a Directorial Feud |website=CineMontage |date=8 December 2017 |access-date=12 May 2025}}
Career
Lerner’s first credited feature was Cry Murder (1950) for Columbia Pictures, initiating a prolific decade that included the docu‑fiction On the Bowery (1956), which won the Grand Prize for Documentary at the Venice Film Festival and the 1957 BAFTA for Best Documentary.{{cite web |url=https://www.ontheboweryfilm.com/about.html |title=About the Film – On the Bowery |website=Milestone Films |access-date=12 May 2025}}{{cite web |url=https://www.bafta.org/awards/film/documentary |title=Documentary in 1957 |website=BAFTA |access-date=12 May 2025}}
His taut cutting of Sidney Lumet’s courtroom drama 12 Angry Men (1957) has been widely cited for intensifying the film’s claustrophobic tension through an accelerating pattern of shot lengths.{{cite web |url=https://lwlies.com/articles/12-angry-men-ultimate-ensemble-drama/ |title=Why 12 Angry Men remains the ultimate ensemble drama |website=Little White Lies |date=11 August 2017 |access-date=12 May 2025}}
Despite critical success, Lerner’s progressive politics led to his gray‑listing during the Hollywood blacklist, making him one of the few East‑Coast editors named in the era’s anti‑Communist campaigns.
Continuing freelance, he cut The Fugitive Kind (1959), Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962), The Swimmer (1968) and Alan J. Pakula’s thriller Klute (1971).{{cite web |url=https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/MovieDetails/53858 |title=Klute (1971) – AFI Catalog |website=AFI Catalog |publisher=American Film Institute |access-date=12 May 2025}}
In 1964, Lerner made his solo directing debut with Black Like Me, adapting John Howard Griffin’s best‑seller into a stark account of segregation‑era racism.{{cite web |url=https://www.motionpictures.org/2013/08/film-historians-on-the-landscape-of-cinema-during-the-civil-rights-era/ |title=Film Historians on the Landscape of Cinema During the Civil‑Rights Era |website=Motion Picture Association |date=29 August 2013 |access-date=12 May 2025}} Alongside film work, he taught editing at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, influencing a generation of editors, including Paul Barnes of Ken Burns’ Florentine Films.{{cite web |url=https://cinemontage.org/the-wizards-of-walpole/ |title=The Wizards of Walpole |website=CineMontage |date=1 September 2007 |access-date=12 May 2025}}
Among Lerner's significant editing credits are the melodrama Cry Murder (1950), 12 Angry Men (1957), Middle of the Night (1959), The Fugitive Kind (1959), Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962), The Swimmer (1968) and Klute (1971); his directing credits include the short documentary American Homes (1949) and Black Like Me (1964).{{cite web |url=https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/71962/cry-murder |title=Cry Murder – Credits |website=Turner Classic Movies |access-date=12 May 2025}}
Personal life
Lerner married Austrian‑born writer, Gerda Lerner, in 1941; they had two children and often collaborated, with Gerda co‑writing Black Like Me.{{cite web |url=https://gerdalerner.com/biography/ |title=Gerda Lerner – Biography |website=Gerda Lerner Estate |access-date=12 May 2025}} Diagnosed with a malignant brain tumour in 1972, he died in New York City on 26 August 1973, aged 61.