Kentucky’s Little Known Oscar Winner

I call it an early Christmas; it’s the Academy Awards. Sunday/tomorrow night, the Oscars will be given out in 23 categories, with the ceremony beginning an hour earlier this year at 6:00 p.m. CST. Comedian/writer/former talk show host Conan O’Brien will be hosting for the first time. I have no solid predictions, but I’m rooting for Demi Moore to win her first Oscar for Best Actress in The Substance.

While we know Louisville native Jennifer Lawrence has been nominated four times and won Best Actress for ‘Silver Linings Playbook’ in 2012. Augusta native George Clooney has won two Oscars, one for Best Supporting Actor in Syriana and as a producer of the 2013 Best Picture winner Argo. However, there's another two-time Oscar winner, and he's also from Louisville.

Henry "Bub" Asman (pictured on the left above) has won two Oscars in the category of Best Sound Editing. His first win was in 2007 for director Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima, and his second Oscar was in 2014, working again with Eastwood on American Sniper. Asman shares both awards with Alan Robert Murray. The duo was also nominated in 1996 for Sound Effects Editing for Eraser and in 2000 for Space Cowboys.  There used to be two sound categories, sound editing and sound mixing; starting with the 2020 ceremony, the category was narrowed down to just Best Sound.

Get our free mobile app

Asman's interest in the audio and visual arts was originally focused on radio. Film courses started piquing his interest in his senior year, and his first job was as a film editor with his brother for a firm in Louisville. John Asman is also a sound engineer; he has won four Emmys. Henry eventually got a job at Paramount Pictures.

Films nominated this year for Best Sound include A Complete Unknown, Dune: Part Two, Emilia Perez, Wicked, and The Wild Robot.