The Last Repair Shop took home the Oscar Sunday for Best Documentary (Short). The film puts the spotlight on those technicians who regularly repair more than 130,000 instruments for L.A. public school students for free — work that has been taking place in a downtown L.A. warehouse since 1959.
In his speech, co-director Kris Bowers noted that the film is about "the heroes in our schools who often go unsung, unthanked and unseen" and pointed to the upper balconies of the audience where those technicians were seated and said, "Tonight, you are sung, you are thanked, you are seen."
He called out John Williams as his inspiration, who, he noted, went to L.A. public schools just as he did. He also introduced 12-year-old Porché Brinker, an LAUSD student and a violinist who appeared in the film and shared the stage with Bowers and his co-director Ben Proudfoot as they accepted the Academy Award.
"She’s playing violin in L.A. public schools. She looks amazing tonight," Bowers noted.
Bowers went on to say that “L.A. is one of the last cities in America to give public school students free and freely prepared instruments. We need to fix that because music education isn’t just about creating incredible musicians. It’s about creating incredible humans.”
Bowers, a musician and award-winning film composer, grew up playing piano through Los Angeles Unified’s music program. But it was only a few years ago that he learned about the people who cared for the instruments that brought him — and so many other students — joy and emotional support over the years.
For Bowers, making the film was a full circle moment. He was able to meet and highlight the work of Steve Bagmanyan, a technician who tuned the pianos in Bowers’ elementary and middle schools. “I was able to literally thank someone who had a hand in my progress as a musician,” Bowers says.
Bagmanyan is one of four workers Bowers and co-director Ben Proudfoot highlight in the film.
Each personal story intersects with a piece of L.A., and maybe even United States history. Dana Atkinson, who works in the strings division, shares his coming out story and a slice of LGBTQ history. Paty Moreno, the only woman technician in the shop, talks about her journey migrating to the U.S. from Mexico and raising her children here — her job in the repair shop helped her maintain some stability, she says. Duane Michaels fixes the woodwind instruments and takes us down memory lane about his time on tour with Elvis.
Then there are the LAUSD students.
“These children are dealing with, you know, the mental health crisis that we're having right now … family health issues, or they are immigrants … trying to find comfort and stability in this country, or in their community,” said Bowers. “Each of these young people [in the film] … talked about the fact that their musical instrument is so vital to them processing these really difficult life experiences.”
In the film, the students, ranging from ages 9-18, talk about how their instrument changed their lives and helped them find themselves in music. “If I didn’t have my violin from my school, I don’t know what I would do,” Porché Brinker says. “Don’t even jinx me with that.”
His introduction to music was commanded before he was born, he jokes in many interviews. His father was adamant about having a boy who would play piano. Music became the way he dealt with strong feelings — from hard conversations with his parents to his own emotions.
When he was 12, he knew he wanted to be a film composer. His family would regularly go to movies on opening weekend and he says he always paid attention to the scoring.
“I remember listening to the scores from those movies when I got home and realizing not only did I have the same — if not sometimes more of — an emotional reaction than I did in the theater just listening to the music by itself, but there was another click of an ‘aha moment’ of like that's a job you translate emotions,” he says.
He made a road map for achieving that dream job; starting with playing in a band, creating his own group and later becoming a film composer in his 50s. The band part didn’t quite go as planned because his composition work took off early. Before he turned 30, Bowers' work hit Hollywood and he composed the music for Best Picture winner Green Book.
Bowers’ other work includes scores for the Bridgerton series, The Color Purple, King Richard and he also co-directed another documentary with Proudfoot, A Concerto is a Conversation.
Directing The Last Repair Shop gave Bowers a chance to blend his love for music and his city.
“For me, having that deep love for this city and to have stumbled upon this music repair shop and this program that exists here in a way that we can be incredibly prideful of the city,” Bowers says. “This was the moment to highlight something that makes L.A. incredibly special and unique in this very grounded and heartfelt way.”
Bowers started playing music at LAUSD Third Street Elementary. He then studied at the Colburn School, the private performing arts school here, and attended the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts before going to Julliard in New York City.
He gives Los Angeles high marks as a great setting for musicians. Growing up, he looked up to his cousin, L.A.-based rapper Murs, and the music coming out of the city. He performed at Leimert Park’s The World Stage and came up with talent like Kamasi Washington and the late Austin Peralta.
Bowers used his composer pen in the film, too (alongside Katya Richardson). He composed some themes for the film, including the song “The Alumni,” for the last scene in the documentary; it’s played by dozens of former and current LAUSD music students in an orchestra — winds, strings, brass, piano. The music highlights the repair shop technicians' musical themes, and the four of them make appearances in the performance.
Most musicians donated their time to film that closing scene.
“There's just so much generosity and love and support for this that it really, I think it can be felt on screen,” Bowers says.
The buzz around the film has already brought attention to the repair shop. There is now a $15 million fundraising effort set up by the LAUSD Education Foundation to help keep the program running and invest in future instrument technicians. To kick off the capital campaign, Bowers donated a restored Steinway piano to his former elementary school.
