One Battle After Another, Sinners

A slew of top Oscar contenders won ACE Eddie Awards for the best in editing on Friday night, affirming their positioning as top Oscar contenders as final Academy voting has just gotten underway. 

When it came to top best-picture candidates One Battle After Another and Sinners, at least, the American Cinema Editors guild did not have to decide, with One Battle’s Andy Jurgensen and Sinners’ Michael P. Shawver, respectively, winning the theatrical comedy and theatrical drama categories. The Oscars only have one editing category, of course, and both ACE Eddie winners are nominated there alongside Sentimental Value, Marty Supreme and F1 — all of which were nominated for ACE Eddies between their two main theatrical categories.

Netflix dominated the rest of the feature-film lineup, with KPop Demon Hunters’ Nathan Schauf winning for animation and The Perfect Neighbor’s Viridiana Lieberman taking home the documentary award. Both movies continue to cruise to Oscar night, where they’re heavily favored to win — though The Perfect Neighbor’s biggest competition, BAFTA doc winner Mr. Nobody Against Putin, was not nominated here.

Moving to TV, Mark Strand of awards juggernaut The Pitt won in drama, overtaking Andor, which actually won the equivalent Emmy back in the fall. The Studio stayed strong in comedy, with Eric Kissack winning the ACE Eddie for the series premiere “The Promotion,” just as he did at the Emmys. 

The limited series race was of particular interest, since the single-take-driven Adolescence wasn’t nominated here (just as it wasn’t in the Emmys’ editing race). While The Penguin had three of the five Emmy-nominated episodes, it lost with the Television Academy to Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, likely a result of vote-splitting. Here, ACE nominated only Henk van Eeghen for the series finale, and he has managed to win. It’s oddly late recognition of the drama, which aired way back in 2024 — in fact, despite its single season, this is the second straight year of ACE Eddie noms for the show because the finale fit within an extended eligibility period. 

Taking place at UCLA’s Royce Hall, the ACE Eddie Awards were hosted by Asif Ali and featured several special award presentations: The ACE Golden Eddie Filmmaker of the Year Award went to Ang Lee; YouTube’s Kim Larson received the ACE Visionary Award; and Arthur Forney and Robert Leighton won ACE Career Achievement awards. See below for the full list of winners.

EDITED FEATURE FILM (Drama, Theatrical):

Sinners
Michael P. Shawver 

BEST EDITED FEATURE FILM (Comedy, Theatrical):

One Battle After Another
Andy Jurgensen

BEST EDITED ANIMATED FEATURE FILM:

KPop Demon Hunters
Nathan Schauf

BEST EDITED DOCUMENTARY FEATURE:

The Perfect Neighbor
Viridiana Lieberman 

BEST EDITED DOCUMENTARY SERIES

Pee-wee as Himself – Part One
Damian Rodriguez

BEST EDITED MULTI-CAMERA COMEDY SERIES:

Frasier (Murder Most Finch)
Russell Griffin, ACE

BEST EDITED SINGLE CAMERA COMEDY SERIES:

The Studio (The Promotion)
Eric Kissack, ACE

BEST EDITED DRAMA SERIES:

The Pitt (6 p.m.)
Mark Strand, ACE

BEST EDITED FEATURE FILM (NON-THEATRICAL):

A Winter’s Song
Yvette M. Amirian, ACE 

BEST EDITED LIMITED SERIES:

The Penguin (A Great or Little Thing)
Henk van Eeghen, ACE

BEST EDITED REALITY SERIES:

Conan O’Brien Must Go (Austria)
Matthew Shaw, ACE
Brad Roelandt

BEST EDITED VARIETY TALK/SKETCH SHOW OR SPECIAL:

Saturday Night Live 50th Anniversary Special
Paul Del Gesso
Christopher Salerno
Ryan Spears
Sean Mcilraith, ACE
Ryan Mcilraith
Daniel Garcia 

BEST EDITED ANIMATED SERIES:

South Park, “Twisted Christian”
David List
Nate Pellettieri

BEST EDITED SHORT:

All The Empty Rooms
Erin Casper, ACE
Stephen Maing
Jeremy Medoff

ANNE V. COATES AWARD FOR STUDENT EDITING:

Luis Barragan – California State University, Fullerton