Oscar-winning Star Wars editor Marcia Lucas dies aged 80

Oscar-winning Star Wars editor Marcia Lucas dies aged 806 minutes agoShareSaveAdd as preferred on GoogleJessica RawnsleyGetty ImagesMarcia Lucas with her fellow Oscar winners Richard Chew and Paul Hirsch at the 1978 Academy AwardsMarcia Lucas, the Oscar-winning editor of the original Star Wars film, has died aged 80.Lucas, who was married to Star Wars creator George Lucas during the making of the first three films, was regarded as a pivotal creative force behind the space saga's early success, imbuing the original series with emotional depth and narrative clarity.She died from metastatic cancer at her home in Rancho Mirage, California, on Wednesday surrounded by loved ones, according to her family."Marcia was a force," her family said in a statement to US media on Friday. "A true trailblazer for women in film and one of the most influential editors in cinematic history; she helped redefine what film editing could be."Lucas won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for 1977's Star Wars - later renamed A New Hope - alongside editors Richard Chew and Paul Hirsch.Although her contributions largely took place behind the scenes, her role in shaping the film's emotional heart and narrative structure has been widely recognised in the decades since its release.George Lucas credited her with helping make sense of the vast amount of footage filmed for the climactic Death Star battle sequence."It was extremely complex and we had 40,000 feet of dialogue footage of pilots saying this and that," he told Rolling Stone shortly after the film's release. "Nobody really has ever tried to interweave an actual plot story into a dogfight, and we were trying to do that."Born Marcia Griffin in Modesto, California, in 1945, she began her career as a film librarian before becoming one of Hollywood's most respected editors.After marrying George Lucas in 1969, she worked on several of his early films, including THX 1138 and Amer...