Early life Sweeney graduated from the
University of Wisconsin, Madison, with a BA in History. She earned a Certificate of Fine Arts from the
Corcoran School of Fine Arts in Washington, D.C. After completing a master's in cinema studies at
New York University, Sweeney worked her way up the ranks of film editing in New York and San Francisco, on films such as
Reds by
Warren Beatty,
Tender Mercies by
Bruce Beresford,
Places in the Heart by
Robert Benton,
Little Drummer Girl by
George Roy Hill, and
The Mean Season by
Phil Boursos.
Collaborations with David Lynch From 1985 to 2006, Sweeney collaborated as producer, writer, script supervisor and editor with filmmaker
David Lynch from
Blue Velvet to
Inland Empire. Her editing credits include
Blue Velvet (1986),
Wild at Heart (1990),
Twin Peaks (1990),
Industrial Symphony (1991),
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992),
On the Air (1992),
Hotel Room (1993),
Lost Highway (1997),
The Straight Story (1999),
Mulholland Drive (2001) and
Baraboo (2009). Sweeney is a consulting producer/writer on
Matthew Weiner's anthology series
The Romanoffs. She won the
British Academy Award for Best Editing for
Mulholland Drive. As producer, she won the
César Award for Best Foreign Film, and the
New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Film. She developed, produced, wrote and edited
The Straight Story, for which
Richard Farnsworth received an Academy Award nomination. As a producer, she won the
European Film Award For Best Foreign Film, and the film received four nominations for the
Independent Spirit Awards: Best Film, Best Director, Best First Screenplay and Best Actor. Her producing credits date from 1995 and include
Lost Highway,
The Straight Story,
Mulholland Drive and
Inland Empire, directed by Lynch, and
Baraboo (2009), her directorial debut based on her original screenplay. Sweeney continued to write screenplays while collaborating with Lynch. These include
The Surprise Party for Paramount Pictures, and
Two Knives, a martial arts film for director
Wong Kar-Wai and
Fox Searchlight Pictures.
Filmmaking Sweeney wrote, directed, produced and edited a short silent film,
In the Eye Abides the Heart, filmed in
Buenos Aires, which premiered at the
2006 Venice Film Festival, and then played the international festival circuit. In 2009, she went on to write, direct, produce and edit her debut feature,
Baraboo, which premiered at the Edinburgh Film Festival and won Best First Feature awards at the Galway Film Fleadh and the Wisconsin Film Festival. Sweeney had been on the board of directors of Film Independent for over two decades since 2000, and was elected chair of the board in 2013, and served nine years in that position before stepping down. Film Independent is a non-profit arts organization that produces the Independent Spirit Awards, the Los Angeles Film Festival, and the Film Independent Series at LACMA. In 2003, Sweeney joined the faculty of the Division of Writing for Screen and Television in the University of Southern California's
School of Cinematic Arts. She was installed as the Dino and Martha De Laurentiis Endowed Professor in 2012.
2010–present Between 2010 and 2015, Sweeney was a Fulbright Film Specialist and traveled for the State Department on Fulbright grants to Jordan, Kazakhstan, Laos, Myanmar and Cuba to mentor filmmakers in those countries. She is vice president and founding member of the
Desert X non-profit's board of directors. Desert X is a site-specific art exhibition in the Coachella Valley. She is a member of the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,
British Academy of Film and Television Arts,
Directors Guild of America, and
Writers Guild of America, where she is on the WGA Independent Writers Committee. ==Awards and nominations==