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84 CINEMONTAGE / Q4 2017 off what had been four minutes of people having no idea what they were watching, and it had what Woody liked to call 'the added bonus' of letting us know that his character was a writer, which struck me as important and was otherwise not established for quite a while." Morse continues: "For me, it also finally made the opening montage feel like part of the film, as well as orienting the audience as to what to expect: a comedy that is also a visual and musical love letter to the city." Ultimately, Allen wrote and recorded a new voiceover for the scene, using the "Chapter 1" motif. During his years with Morse, Allen arguably enjoyed his most fruitful years as a filmmaker. He went back to the dramatic well with September (1987) and Another Woman (1988), while he perfected the art of folding two stories into a single film with Hannah and Her Sisters and Crimes and Misdemeanors. Some films, like The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), are marked by fluid, seemingly effortless editing, while others, like Husbands and Wives (1992) and Deconstructing Harry (1997), feature jagged, visible cutting. "Husbands and Wives was amazingly close to the way Woody originally planned it," she remembers. "That doesn't mean it didn't change in the editing process, simply that it changed in ways Woody had wanted it to change. The plan was to treat the dailies like documentary footage, where you could jump-cut wherever you wanted — wherever the emotional logic took you." Morse eventually served as editor of 22 Allen films, with her responsibilities growing to encompass overseeing subtitles and home video transfers, as well as researching video editing equipment for Zelig (1983) and model submarines for Radio Days (1987). Only once did their collaboration come close to being interrupted. In 1987, during production of Another Woman, Morse was pregnant with her son, Dwight. "When I told Woody that I was pregnant, and therefore I probably wouldn't be able to do the next picture, he said, 'Wait a second. That's too radical. We can work this out.'" The filmmaker's solution: The screening room could be turned into a part-time nursery for Dwight. "Of course," she adds, "I didn't realize it would lead to my working until 10:00 p.m. the night before I went into labor!" Along with many of Allen's tried-and-true collaborators, Morse's working relationship with Allen concluded in the late 1990s, due to what a 1998 New York Times article characterized as "cost- cutting measures" on his films. "A number of people who worked for years at certain prices couldn't afford to stay on," Allen admitted in the article. Morse agrees: "That was a matter of the studios deciding they didn't want to back his pictures anymore, and the independent backers who took over thinking younger people would cost less." Her last film with the director was Celebrity (1998). Allen was faced with finding a new editor for the first time since the late 1970s. This time, instead of promoting an assistant from within the ranks, he turned to an established editor — albeit one with only a single solo feature film under her belt: After working as an assistant on several notable films, including Martin Scorsese's The Age of Innocence (1993), Lepselter had cut Nicole Holofcener's Walking and Talking (1996) herself. "I got a call that he wanted to meet me because he was interviewing potential editors," Allen's current editor remembers. "Honestly, I thought it must be a mistake, but I thought, 'Well, if nothing else, I'll get to meet Woody Allen.'" Instead of a memorable anecdote, however, Lepselter walked away with a job to edit Sweet and Lowdown. "When I was told that he wanted to hire me, I obviously felt like I couldn't say no," she says. "I was stunned and thrilled — and I've been there Alisa Lepselter. Photo by Sarah Shatz