Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/942009
24 CINEMONTAGE / Q1 2018 family were Mets fans," Lowry recalls. "But the rest of us were all rabid Yankees fans." An early interest in photography and film led Lowry to decide to pursue a career in cinematography. Upon graduation from Hunter College High School, she applied to five schools with solid cinema programs, but ultimately chose the University of Southern California. "USC not only accepted me into the film program as a freshman," Lowry relates, "but they also offered me their highest scholarship for undergraduates, the Trustee Scholarship." She graduated with a bachelor's degree in cinema production in 1984, but also walked away with a second team (and sport) to cheer for: the USC Trojans football squad. "In the sports world," she comments, "my teams are the Trojans in football and the Yankees in baseball." Lowry initially entered the industry as an assistant cameraperson, but several experiences on music videos — including Tina Turner's "What's Love Got to Do with It" — caused her to reconsider. "For atmosphere, they used a lot of bee smoke on these music videos, so the job just seemed like it was lifting heavy equipment from Point A to Point B all day long while breathing bee smoke, which wasn't very glamorous," Lowry comments. "Not that I was looking for glamour, but I wasn't necessarily looking for hard labor and breathing toxic fumes." Through an acquaintance from USC, Lowry got a job as a production assistant to supervising sound editor Sandy Berman on the apocalyptic sci-fi thriller Radioactive Dreams (1985). "That was also hard labor, lugging heavy loads of film reels all over town, but by the end of the movie, they promoted me from runner to assistant sound editor," she remembers. "They taught me a lot of skills that I didn't learn from going to film school." Lowry began working as an assistant sound editor, adding picture editorial to her plate with Broadcast News (1987), on which she served as apprentice editor. "I was really more interested in picture than anything," she comments. "Working in picture, you get exposed to all aspects of post." She rose through the ranks to become an assistant editor on such films as Grand Canyon and The Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe (both 1991) but, after giving birth to her first child, she decided to take a break from the business. "Post- production is very demanding and I thought I needed to find another career," she reflects. Before she could figure out a way to reinvent herself, she learned she was going to have a second child, and as the main breadwinner of the family, she had to get back to work. After being asked to fill in as an assistant music editor on Judgment Night (1993), Lowry re-entered the business and never looked back. "From that gig," she says, "I ended up staying with Modern Music and working there as an assistant for several years." Lowry discovered that she was drawn to the problem-solving posed by music editing. "I love to do The New York Times crossword puzzle — I get that from my mom," she comments. "I think of music editing as solving puzzles. Oftentimes, picture editors will cut to music and they'll have things hitting exactly where they want it, but the problem is they haven't cut the music musically. I enjoy the challenge of fixing puzzles." The music editors she worked with as an assistant, Lowry says, gave her leeway to work on cutting songs. "I got to work on all the songs in Good Will Hunting [1997]," she recalls. "Pietro Scalia had cut a lot of footage to these songs before I was involved, but then I got to re-edit them for the film. One of the most amazing things on that film was getting to watch the late Elliott Smith record his version of the Beatles' 'Something.' It's moments like that that just take your breath away." 61*. HBO/Photofest Stephanie Lowry at the new Yankee Stadium in 2015.