Stephanie Filo
Stephanie Filo is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning editor best known for her work on HBO’s A Black Lady Sketch Show and Supervillain: The Making of Tekashi 69, among many many others. Now based in Los Angeles but having grown up in Colorado and Sierra Leone, Stephanie also cuts many social impact docs, including her own PSA “End Ebola Now” which was viewed widely, spawning dance videos from celebrities to bring awareness, and helped lead to the eradication of Ebola in Sierra Leone. She’s also cut specials like Kim Kardashian West: The Justice Project, following Kim K as she works to help incarcerated people be released from prison, and finally, Separated, a short doc for which she won an Emmy, about ICE deportations and their effects on families.
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On this episode we get into:
-Getting the editing bug from watching the Se7en intro titles
-Dancing's relationship to Editing
-The imposter syndrome
-Reality vs Documentary
-Keeping your career diverse and keeping diversity in Post
-Cutting from the heart (and winning awards for it)
Unfortunately a lot of Stephanie’s work is attached to TV shows or Docs which can’t be easily displayed here. I do recommend having a look and seeking out whatever you can
Stephanie mentions that the intro titles to Se7en initially inspired her to pursue filmmaking in whatever form
A trailer for Kim Kardashian West: The Justice Project. The trailer is not Stephanie’s but the film is.
https://www.nbc.com/kim-kardashian-west-the-justice-project/video/kim-kardashian-west-the-justice-project/4142127
This trailer is not Stephanie’s own work, but a look inside the limited series on which she worked (eps 2 & 3). Check it out on Showtime.
https://www.sho.com/supervillain-the-making-of-tekashi-6is9ine
One of Stephanie’s favorite sketches she cut for HBO’s A Black Lady Sketch Show
I love this example she gave- in cutting “Gel It Like Is Is” for HBO’s A Black Lady Sketch Show, she pulled inspiration from Blackalicious’ song “Alphabet Aerobics” (seen below), constantly increasing the tempo in order to create a more frantic edit. It’s a great example of how an editor’s past interests and knowledge are always being pulled from to inform current edits
