Biography
Harold F. Kress (26 June 1913 – 18 September 1999) was an American film editor who worked on more than fifty feature films between 1939 and 1978, primarily at MGM. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, he studied law at UCLA before entering the industry through an opportunity at MGM's editing department.
Kress edited several notable MGM productions in the 1940s, including Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941), Mrs. Miniver (1942) and Random Harvest (1942). He later edited How the West Was Won (1962), The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and The Towering Inferno (1974). He won Academy Awards for Best Film Editing for the latter two films and received four additional nominations.
In the early 1950s he directed a small number of feature films, among them The Painted Hills (1951) and No Questions Asked (1951). His son Carl Kress also became a film editor and shared an Oscar with him for The Towering Inferno.
