Photo: Jo!Hannes / CC BY-SA 4.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
Ben Burtt might be the most influential person most moviegoers have never heard of. He didn't just record sound for Star Wars, he invented an entire sonic vocabulary, the lightsaber hum, R2-D2's chirps, the blaster crack, that we now hear in our heads automatically. Add E.T., Indiana Jones, WALL-E, and a fistful of Academy Awards, and you're looking at a man who taught Hollywood that sound is storytelling, not decoration. What I love is that he treated noises as characters. WALL-E barely speaks, yet Burtt gave that little robot a soul out of beeps and whirs. That's craftsmanship verging on alchemy.
Overview
Benjamin Burtt Jr. (born July 12, 1948) is an American sound designer, film director, film editor, screenwriter, and voice actor. As a sound designer, his credits include the Star Wars and Indiana Jones film series, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), WALL-E (2008), and Star Trek (2009).
Summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- Ben Burtt
- Name (Japanese)
- ベン・バート
- Reading
- べん・ばーと
- Born
- July 12, 1948 (age 77)
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Cancer / Rat
- Origin
- Jamesville, United States
- Blood type
- Private
- Height
- Private
- Agency
- Private
- Occupation
- film director / screenwriter / film editor / actor / sound designer
2. Background
- Elementary school
- Private
- Junior high
- Private
- High school
- Nottingham High School
- University
- University of Southern California
Awards & achievements
- 1978 Special Achievement Academy Award
- 1983 Academy Award for Best Sound Editing
- 1990 Academy Award for Best Sound Editing
- 1982 Special Achievement Academy Award
3. Relationships
- Spouse
- Private
- Children
- Private
- Parents
- Private
- Siblings
- Private
4. Personality
Motto
Private
6. Links
Film director — see all → · Screenwriter — see all → · More people from United States →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-02
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public items are marked "Private / Unknown". English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.