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Washington, D.C. " H a l wo u l d n eve r ta l k to m e a b o u t stuff," Zimmerman told me in 2018. "He said, 'I want to see your thoughts.' Then we would just sit together and talk, and say, 'Oh, let's try this or that.' Or, 'That's really a good idea.'. . . He wouldn't say that you were wrong, but he would guide you in different avenues." Although he had built up a rapport with Ashby over the course of more than a decade, Zimmerman was equally at ease with the directors he came to work with in subsequent years, including such big per- sonalities as Warren Beatty on "Heaven Can Wait" and Sylvester Stallone on "Rocky III" (1982), "Staying Alive" (1983), and "Rocky IV" (1985). " H e w a s s u p e r - e a s y g o i n g a n d g o t along with everybody," said his daughter, costumer Debi Zimmerman. "That was just my dad's personality. He could hang with the best of them. I think that's why every- one liked working with him — he was just so accommodating." A favorite project, Debi Zimmerman said, was Barbra Streisand's acclaimed adaptation of Pat Conroy's "The Prince of Tides" (1991), starring Nick Nolte, Strei- sand, and Blythe Danner. "It was a nice collaboration," Debi Zimmerman said. "She really valued his opinion, and he loved being able to tell such a beautiful story." In her 2023 autobiography, "My Name Is Barbra," Streisand described Zimmerman as "very supportive." "One day as Don and I were color-correcting the print . . . and I have to say Stephen Goldblatt gave the film a beautiful look . . . he turned to me and said, 'You've made a f---ing good movie.' Don is not the kind of editor who gives casual com- pliments, so I felt this warm rush of pride," Streisand wrote in her book. After "The Prince of Tides," Zimmerman increasingly focused on comedic material, including "The Nutty Professor," "Liar Liar" (1997), and "The Cat in the Hat" (2003). One especially notable comedy was "Galaxy Quest." For director Dean Parisot, whose second directorial outing this was, working with Zimmerman was a learning experience. "He was so adept at performance and story and structure, having this giant body of work behind him, that for me, starting out, in a lot of ways there are things that got rewritten in post," Parisot said. "He just had a gift. He was able to immediately see where something was headed — what was necessary, what wasn't." For example, Zimmerman presented Parisot with an edit of "Galaxy Quest" that stripped away a lot of material the director had thought essential. "His editor's assem- bly was done the day after we had wrapped," Parisot said. "I go in and he said, 'I cut out a lot of the exposition.' I said, 'What? What do you mean?' He said, 'I cut out a lot of the exposition. Don't be shocked.' I watched it, and I was like, 'Oh my God, he cut out all this stuff,' and then afterwards, I [realized] all of it was not necessary. He was totally right. He just cut for story and performance, and there was the movie." Zimmerman continued to work as an A-list editor on films including "Night at the Museum" (2006) and its sequel, "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian" (2009), "Marmaduke" (2010), and "Men in Black 3" (2012). Zimmerman also cut each of Parisot's subsequent films: "Fun with Dick and Jane" (2005), "Red 2" (2013), and his last hurrah, the high-spirited sequel "Bill & Ted Face the Music," for which he came out of retirement. D o n n a Z i m m e r m a n s a i d t h a t h e r husband worked long hours, consumed prodigious quantities of coffee, and enjoyed every bit of it. "It was his whole life," she said, comparing his career to a second childhood for him. "I was so happy to be able to be home with my kids and keep the house steady for him so when he came home, it was always a good place for him to be," she said. Zimmerman relished introducing his children to the business that had nurtured him. Each of his five children have entered filmmaking, including sons (and picture editors) Dan, Dean, and David. "He loved to teach," Donna Zimmerman said. "No matter what it was — if we went water skiing, and it was a bunch of new people, he loved to teach them how to water ski." Five years ago, Zimmerman, who had survived a bout with non-Hodgkin's lym- phoma, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and told that he had no more than six months to a year to live. "He gave us an extra four-and-a-half years that we had not intended to have," Donna Zimmerman said. For much of that time, Zimmerman lived and worked without worrying about the specter of the diagnosis, but in the summer, he quickly declined. Zimmerman, who was nominated for an Academy Award for editing "Coming Home," was honored with the ACE Career Achievement Award in 2023. "We've actu- ally got his ashes here and his award right next to the ashes," Donna Zimmerman said. "He was very proud of that." In addition to his wife, Zimmerman is survived by his five children, Dean, Dan, David, Debi, and Dana, and his seven grand- children, Joseph, Sofia, Isabella, Gabriella, Kamryn, Amylia, and Madeline. ■ — Peter Tonguette 66 C I N E M O N T A G E I N M E M O R I A M