‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Brings Back Original Co-Editor Chris Lebenzon

Original Top Gun co-editor Chris Lebenzon is feeling the need…to return to the franchise that earned him his first Academy Award nomination. More than 33 years after he edited the original 1986 Top Gun with Billy Weber, Lebenzon has been tapped as the Top Gun: Maverick editor.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Chris Lebenzon has been bired by Paramount and Skydance to work on Top Gun: Maverick, the long-awaited sequel to Tony Scott’s 1980s action aviation classic. Lebenzon cut together the 1986 original with Billy Weber, earning an Oscar nomination for his work and credit for introducing what is called “MTV-style” editing to movies.

Lebenzon and Weber’s editing nod was only one of several Oscar nominations the original film earned, which included sound, sound effects editing, and won an Academy Award for original song (Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away”). But it was only the beginning of Lebenzon’s bright career, as the editor would go on to earn a second second Oscar nomination for the 1995 thriller Crimson Tide, starring Gene Hackman and Denzel Washington, which was also directed by Top Gun‘s Scott and produced by Bruckheimer. The industry veteran has been editing Tim Burton’s movies for the past 25 years, including Sweeney Todd, Big Fish, and most recently, Dumbo. Top Gun: Maverick will reunite Lebenzon not only with the film that earned him his first Oscar nomination, but with star Tom Cruise, who he worked with again on Days of Thunder, also helmed by Scott.

Joseph Kosinski is directing Top Gun Maverick, which sees Tom Cruise reprising his famous role as hotheaded pilot Pete “Maverick” Mitchell as he guides a new generation of pilots, including Miles Teller‘s Bradley Bradshaw, the son of Nick “Goose” Bradshaw, Maverick’s best friend who died tragically in an ejection accident. Also starring in the movie are Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Glen Powell, Lewis Pullman, and Ed Harris, with Val Kilmer reprising his role as Iceman. Jerry Bruckheimer returns as producer.

Top Gun: Maverick flies into theaters on June 26, 2020.

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