Quis Ego Sum

I started at a young age in the late nineteen-seventies with hand-drawn cartoons which, while I didn’t know this at the time, was less about cartoons and more about learning to storyboard. Inspired by the then hugely popular Pink Panther and James Bond film series I created characters who were clumsy secret agents and incompetent spies, fighting evil doers with lots of gadgets. Such is the mind of a thirteen-year-old. Mad Magazine inspired me to draw full length parodies of Star Wars, The Spy Who Loved Me and others. My draughtsman skills may have been limited, but in the years before VHS the act of drawing entire feature length films from memory proved to be a great training exercise.

In 1982, aged 17, I wrote and staged Andrea Mack, a modern-day semi-musical English language adaptation of Andromaque by Jean Racine, using lip-sync and contemporary songs to accompany the florid text. Andrea Mack was inspired partly by the 1978 television adaption of Dennis Potter’s Pennies From Heaven, and partly by Jonathan Miller’s 1982 production of Verdi's Rigoletto set against the backdrop of New York’s Little Italy in the 1950s.

After final exams and an attachment to the West Surrey College of Art and Design’s film program, I went to work as a stage technician at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre on a pre-West End preview run of Chekov’s The Cherry Orchard directed by the great British filmmaker Lindsay Anderson. In 1984 I moved to London to work as a stage technician on, amongst others, a new revival of Gower Champion and David Merrick’s production of 42nd Street at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, and as a stage electrician on Starlight Express at the Apollo Victoria. These were extraordinary, state of the art environments filled with the most talented artists of the day and just being there was a unique experience.

After three years of working ‘backstage’ while shooting short 8mm films, creating visual experiments and never-to-be-seen music videos, in 1987 I made the 15 minute film: Headsounds. It was shot on a Sony8 video camera and edited with a Sony8 video player using only the play, record and pause buttons. No pre-roll, no preview, no ability to accurately sync sound to picture. This last limitation rendered the film ‘silent’, even though scenes had been played with scripted and improvised dialogue. The soundtrack was assembled on a Yamaha M3TX 4-track and had to be manually mixed and recorded to picture in one take; if the sync was off I had to start over.

In 1990 I moved to Rome, Italy and in 1992 I made two documentaries for RAI that I recorded in Kashmir, India on the simmering civil war and its impact on the region. As anything bigger than a camcorder was a no-go in Srinagar it was shot on a SonyHi8, the quality looks pretty ropey today, but it was a big deal in 1992.

After four years in the United States working film production, in 1998 I returned to Rome where I worked consistently in production and post production for satellite and cable television, home video and theatrical.

As far as ‘What kind of projects have I worked on’ is concerned, the list is long and varied and represented to one degree or another across this site. A majority of the work here is promotional, but everything has a construct and story behind it; and everything has been approached with great empathy for the material, what it is 'in and of itself', and how best to frame it for the primary exhibition platform.

When Brian Eno was commissioned by Microsoft to compose the famous start up music for Windows known as ‘The Microsoft Sound’ he described the brief thus: ‘“We want a piece of music that is inspiring, universal...” blah-blah, da-da-da, “optimistic, futuristic, sentimental, emotional,” this whole list of adjectives, and then at the bottom it said “and it must be 3.25 seconds long.”’ But Eno goes on to describe the task: ‘In fact, I made 84 pieces. I got completely into this world of tiny, tiny little pieces of music... It's like making a tiny little jewel.’ And that's how I view teasers, promos and trailers. Great opportunities to work in miniature and to test-drive ideas about image, sound and music that will then inform all my work.

For me every job is different and needs to be addressed on a case by case basis. There is no ‘one size fits all’, and that applies to subject matter, project type, clients and directors. Everyone is unique, everyone wants something ‘different’, everyone has less time than they would like, everyone has an eye on the budget, everyone argues about what they think they are after.

If I have a personal style I would say ‘as clean, linear and smooth as possible.’ Unless there is an explicit purpose to doing otherwise, technique should support the story without drawing attention to itself. That does not mean to exclude any particular technique or style per se, but nothing should be front and centre for its own sake. The audience is not supposed to sit there thinking about the writing, the editing, the graphics or the audio. They should be immersed in the ‘experience’ whether it is a promotion, an entertainment or factual. An eighty minute program, film or documentary on any given subject can be ‘fast paced’, ‘measured’ or ‘interminable’ depending on intentions and talent. Trying to say too much is just as bad as saying too little, and the trick is to hit the right number of notes, at the right time, at the right tempo over any given duration. The goal is always a symphony, not a cacophony.

The approach that unites all my work to create a dynamic, original perspective, to tell a good story and tell it well, to allow collaborators their say, to be passionate but pragmatic, to recognise the importance of seeking excellence, to avoid mediocrity and to do it all on time and on budget. If that sounds over-ambitious, well at least it’s a good place from where to start.

I have 30+ years of experience in documentaries, dramas, shorts, marketing campaigns, branding and promotion; recognised with creative nominations and awards. As a professional editor I have worked on multiple platforms for almost every type of production. I also specialise in music editing and sound design.

While the majority of my career has been in television and cinema this does not limit the scope of either my interests or abilities.

Born and educated in the UK, I have worked in Norway, the United States and Italy where I lived permanently from 1998 to 2025.

YouTube Channel: @KGSMMediaCache

Internet Movie Database: Stuart Mabey

Selected Filmography

In the Mind of Narcissus (2024)

Format: 8 × 30′

Role(s): Editor, VFX

Production: La Casa Rossa / RAI

Notes: Crime investigation series

Enigma Rol (2023)

Format: 98′ Documentary

Role(s): Editor, Sound Design, Assistant Director

Production: La Casa Rossa / Luce Cinecittà

Festival: 18th Rome Film Festival – Special Screenings

Awards: Nastro d’Argento - Best Docufilm

Notes: The life of Gustavo Rol

Franco Zeffirelli, Rebel Conformist (2022)

Format: 123′ Documentary

Role(s): Editor, Sound Design, Assistant Director

Production: La Casa Rossa / RAI

Festival: 79th Venice International Film Festival – Venice Classics

Awards: David di Donatello - nomination

Notes: The life and career of Franco Zeffirelli

Diabolik - behind the mask (2022)

Format: 47′ Documentary

Role(s): Writer, Editor

Production: Mompracem / RAI Cinema

Notes: The making of Diabolik

Django & Django (2021)

Format: 77′ Documentary

Role(s): Editor, Sound Design, Animation

Production: Nicomax / Lucky Red / Netflix

Festival: 78th Venice International Film Festival Official Selection (Out of Competition)

Awards: Nastro d’Argento - nomination

Notes: Quentin Tarantino discusses the work of Sergio Corbucci

Fellini of the Spirits (2020)

Format: 100′ Documentary

Role(s): Editor, Sound Design, Assistant Director

Production: Mad Entertainment / RAI

Festival: Cannes Classics – Official Selection

Notes: The hidden world of Federico Fellini

Marco Ferreri: Dangerous But Necessary (2017)

Format: 80′ Documentary

Role(s): Editor, Sound Design, Assistant Director

Production: Nicomax / Sky Arts

Festival: 74th Venice International Film Festival – Venice Classics

Awards: David di Donatello - Best Documentary

Awards: Nastro d’Argento - Best Documentary

Notes: Portrait of Marco Ferreri

The Stones Cry Out (2015)

Format: 56′ Documentary

Role(s): Producer, Post Production Supervisor

Production: Yasmine Perni

Festival: Special presentation toured in Europe, USA and Israel

Notes: Voices of the Palestinian Christians

A Car with Two Engines (2014)

Format: 62′ Documentary

Role(s): Director, Editor

Production: Lucky Red Home Video

Notes: Franco Brusati and the making of Bread and Chocolate

Francesca... viva la vita! (2010)

Format: 74′ Documentary

Role(s): Co-Director, Editor

Production: ElectricLight

Festival: 67th Venice International Film Festival – Giornate degli Autori

Notes: Francesca's ten-year fight with cancer

Gavin Bryars' The Sinking of the Titanic (2005)

Format: 77′ Concept Film

Role(s): Photography, Animation, Editor

Production: ElectricLight

Festival: 49th International Festival of Contemporary Music, Venice Biennale

Festival: Masters of Mistery, Auditorium Parco della Musica, Rome 2007

Notes: Video installation for live performace

Kashmir – Blood on the roof of the world (1993)

Format: 10′ Documentary

Role(s): Director, Photography, Writer

Production: RAI Tg2 Pegaso

Notes: The forgotten civil war in Kashmir, India

Kashmir (1993)

Format: 50′ Documentary

Role(s): Director, Photography, Writer

Production: RAI DSE

Notes: Life in Kashmir, India under military occupation