This website is not affiliated with the Evancho family in any way.
This off-the-cuff creation is done solely on my own with the intention of assisting Miss Evancho in her desire to perform in films by writing for her age-appropriate screenplays that feature her singing.
I consider her an international treasure, her wondrous singing and her engaging personality making people from diverse and sometimes antagonistic cultures all around the world realize their common humanity. Her incredible skill and thoughtful nature at such a young age promise decades of beneficial affects for our world. If I can assist her career in any way, I’ll feel I’ve done something truly useful.
I started with three film scripts I wrote specifically with her in mind, and then added a fourth script, Johnstown, and it's somewhat anomalous. I had been working on it before I began these scripts for Miss Evancho, and it occurred to me that simply by giving the wealthy young heroine a profession of singing, it could easily be adapted for Miss Evancho. The problem is that she won't be old enough to play the part for several years as the heroine starts out engaged and there's chaste romance. But I'd rather see her play the part than anyone else, so perhaps in the future...
In addition to the scripts, there are loglines, brief summaries, somewhat overly-detailed synopses, and beat sheets.
Of course I’d like to see one or more of these made, but if they’re not, that’s okay. I write for recreation. My definition of recreation is the thing that absorbs you, that when you’re doing it, there is little thought of past or future, just presence in the moment. Happiness (and maybe that’s not the perfect word for the feeling, but it’s good) arises from being in the moment. I’m there while writing, and I believe Miss Evancho will understand this as her singing takes her to that place.
I am, obviously, a fan of Miss Evancho. I’ve never been a fan before. I’ve admired performers and enjoyed their art, but no one captured me. Miss Evancho, for both apparent and mysterious reasons, has captured me.
I discovered her somewhat late in her career. I was staying in Rosarito, Mexico, for a time around Christmas, 2012, and as the television was largely in Spanish which I don’t speak, I was poking around on the web. I thought to watch on youtube the discovery of Susan Boyle which I’ve always found touching, and in the list of videos to the right I saw a clip of a young singer, Jackie Evancho, on America’s Got Talent back in 2010. I watched it and have never stopped watching/listening.
One of the more amazing things to me is that I’ve been consistently more impressed by her singing the longer I’ve listened. I’m at the point that the video of her singing Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again at the age of seven feels like watching a rocket motor ignite. Her voice at nine and the rocket has to be bolted down not to jump from the launch-pad. At ten, it’s spell-binding to watch the blaze high in the atmosphere as it begins to curve for orbit. I listen to her sing a particular song and think “that’s my favorite,” until she sings another. I used to love listening to Andrea Bocelli sing Con Te Partiro; now, I just listen to Miss Evancho sing it at various ages and venues. Celine Dion is a vastly talented singer; but listen to twelve-year-old Miss Evancho sing My Heart Will Go On with the emotion she conveys and you realize you’re hearing something almost unimaginable.
Mr. Robert Redford made an inspired decision to have her act in his film The Company You Keep. I think half the people that watched the film probably did so just to see her. She’s expressed how much she enjoyed the experience and would like to do more acting in films, though in her heart it will never replace singing, for which we all should be grateful. If the two can be successfully combined – and there’s no reason they shouldn’t – it’s just another dimension to her career and another thing for her fans to enjoy. I’m certainly going to enjoy seeing her in films whether in my work or that of someone else, adding her own songs to the wonderful selections from films that she gave us on Songs from the Silver Screen.
In an interview on GMA, Mr. Redford spoke with George Stephanopoulos about Miss Evancho:
STEPHANOPOULOS: And the little girl who plays your daughter, Jackie Evancho, I mean, -the singer, but what a remarkable performer.
REDFORD: This is an incredible story. I'm casting the little girl. I'm sitting in a hotel room four nights before we're going to film. And it's not cast. I'm really depressed. And I'm surfing the TV and suddenly this face comes on, this angelic face, just beautiful angelic face.
[Clip of Jackie Evancho singing.]
REDFORD: I get the casting agent and say find this person. I don't know where she is.
STEPHANOPOULOS: She won the lottery.
REDFORD: She won the lottery. Shows up three days later. She was so real and so lovely. Well, you'll see when she comes on. That was a joy. One of those wonderful risks that works.
Apart from being born with that voice, I don't think Miss Evancho got anything just by being lucky. If anyone won the lottery in this exchange, it was Mr. Redford by having her in his movie. It would have been a more interesting film if it concentrated on her and her reactions to having a father accused of murder and going on the run to clear himself. I would have had her instrumental in persuading the radical who could clear him to come forward.
In an interview about acting in the film, Miss Evancho talked about how difficult it was to cry on cue. To the best of my knowledge, there was no scene in the movie that had her crying and I'm thinking the scene didn't make the final cut. Natalie Portman in an interview she gave looking back on making The Professional at the age of eleven also talked about her difficulty in crying on cue. I think Ms. Portman's interview(s) are instructive for young actors. Here are the youtube links:
Natalie Portman "Léon" Interview PART 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vq3Detj2Pys
Natalie Portman "Léon" Interview Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mTAodEOe48
Background to scripts
On the Sunday before Labor Day, 2013, I was sitting on my patio in Las Vegas deciding what to work on while I listened to my compilation of Miss Evancho’s singing. Sometime before, I had read of her mother, Mrs. Lisa Evancho, saying that they were looking for another movie for her daughter to do, and I’d been mulling over a plot about a deprived young woman escaping her bleak life by having her talent for singing discovered – The Jackie Evancho Story if she’d not been so lucky as to have the family she does.
I started writing Angel and in four days, one of which I took off from work, it was done, by far the most inspired script I’ve ever written. There are now seventy-two revised versions, but most of them are only minor changes of dialogue and such. The only major revision was having one of the characters early in the script discover her at the graveyard where her mentors later go to look for her when she and her brother are missing, explaining how they knew the children might be there.
I set it in Pittsburgh for the family’s convenience and because Pittsburgh’s weary industrial look is a perfect backdrop. I put the script and related material on my website, www.brucemacintyre.info, and sent a letter and some scenes to the Evancho’s home address that I found on the web and got the package returned with an “Unforwardable” stamp. They’d moved. I sent emails and then letters to her agent at William Morris Endeavor and her manager at Align, an email to the Evancho family website, and a letter to a P.O. box associated with the family, and received no response which was understandable and, from experience, expected.
I had mentioned in my communications that the gritty feel of the script might work for her career the way “The Professional” had for the career of Natalie Portman. In an interview, Miss Portman said, “By starting out as an adult in a film for grown-ups, I think it eased my transition into adult acting more because people have been looking at me as like a woman sort of since I was a little girl.” Another thing I mentioned was my feeling that there are parts in the film that could be played by her siblings. I find them delightful in the video clips of her life, seeing and hearing their dreams and watching them grow.
As Angel had not inspired any response, I began thinking that a script with a change of tone might be useful. The video clip of an interview with her at home where she appeared to be a fairly accomplished archer had set me thinking that making her a female Robin Hood in medieval England might be an interesting twist. But somehow violence, even for a just reason, didn’t seem to fit with her character and as I worked on the plot it evolved so that archery was out and she was a gentle soul (and secret princess, heir to the throne) that uses her singing to invoke the magic with the animals that saves the day.
I got a about half-way through another script, a science-fiction piece, but I found the monsters rather uninteresting and little way to involve Miss Evancho’s singing, so I’ve put it aside to let it percolate for a time.
The third script, The Little People, was conceived as a weird thriller involving a mafioso on the run who meets a leprechaun married to a princess of the magic little people of Hawaii, together foiling a dastardly plot by Adolph Hitler’s unknown son to create a terrorist incident involving the volcano Kilauea. I replaced the mafioso with Miss Evancho who’s magical singing makes the little people reveal themselves to her, and made a better script I believe.
More communications brought the same silence and I've submitted queries to agents in general with the same lack of response (WME, her agency, returned my letter by certified mail). My feeling is that if the Evancho family reads the scripts and feels intrigued with the possibilities, their contacts have a far better chance of attracting a producer. I should be a better sales-person, but for me it’s a chore while writing is a delight, and there’s only so much time.
In any case, I’m enjoying myself and looking forward to writing more scripts for her as she gets older, regardless of whether they go anywhere or not. I hope you enjoy some part of this lunacy.
This off-the-cuff creation is done solely on my own with the intention of assisting Miss Evancho in her desire to perform in films by writing for her age-appropriate screenplays that feature her singing.
I consider her an international treasure, her wondrous singing and her engaging personality making people from diverse and sometimes antagonistic cultures all around the world realize their common humanity. Her incredible skill and thoughtful nature at such a young age promise decades of beneficial affects for our world. If I can assist her career in any way, I’ll feel I’ve done something truly useful.
I started with three film scripts I wrote specifically with her in mind, and then added a fourth script, Johnstown, and it's somewhat anomalous. I had been working on it before I began these scripts for Miss Evancho, and it occurred to me that simply by giving the wealthy young heroine a profession of singing, it could easily be adapted for Miss Evancho. The problem is that she won't be old enough to play the part for several years as the heroine starts out engaged and there's chaste romance. But I'd rather see her play the part than anyone else, so perhaps in the future...
In addition to the scripts, there are loglines, brief summaries, somewhat overly-detailed synopses, and beat sheets.
Of course I’d like to see one or more of these made, but if they’re not, that’s okay. I write for recreation. My definition of recreation is the thing that absorbs you, that when you’re doing it, there is little thought of past or future, just presence in the moment. Happiness (and maybe that’s not the perfect word for the feeling, but it’s good) arises from being in the moment. I’m there while writing, and I believe Miss Evancho will understand this as her singing takes her to that place.
I am, obviously, a fan of Miss Evancho. I’ve never been a fan before. I’ve admired performers and enjoyed their art, but no one captured me. Miss Evancho, for both apparent and mysterious reasons, has captured me.
I discovered her somewhat late in her career. I was staying in Rosarito, Mexico, for a time around Christmas, 2012, and as the television was largely in Spanish which I don’t speak, I was poking around on the web. I thought to watch on youtube the discovery of Susan Boyle which I’ve always found touching, and in the list of videos to the right I saw a clip of a young singer, Jackie Evancho, on America’s Got Talent back in 2010. I watched it and have never stopped watching/listening.
One of the more amazing things to me is that I’ve been consistently more impressed by her singing the longer I’ve listened. I’m at the point that the video of her singing Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again at the age of seven feels like watching a rocket motor ignite. Her voice at nine and the rocket has to be bolted down not to jump from the launch-pad. At ten, it’s spell-binding to watch the blaze high in the atmosphere as it begins to curve for orbit. I listen to her sing a particular song and think “that’s my favorite,” until she sings another. I used to love listening to Andrea Bocelli sing Con Te Partiro; now, I just listen to Miss Evancho sing it at various ages and venues. Celine Dion is a vastly talented singer; but listen to twelve-year-old Miss Evancho sing My Heart Will Go On with the emotion she conveys and you realize you’re hearing something almost unimaginable.
Mr. Robert Redford made an inspired decision to have her act in his film The Company You Keep. I think half the people that watched the film probably did so just to see her. She’s expressed how much she enjoyed the experience and would like to do more acting in films, though in her heart it will never replace singing, for which we all should be grateful. If the two can be successfully combined – and there’s no reason they shouldn’t – it’s just another dimension to her career and another thing for her fans to enjoy. I’m certainly going to enjoy seeing her in films whether in my work or that of someone else, adding her own songs to the wonderful selections from films that she gave us on Songs from the Silver Screen.
In an interview on GMA, Mr. Redford spoke with George Stephanopoulos about Miss Evancho:
STEPHANOPOULOS: And the little girl who plays your daughter, Jackie Evancho, I mean, -the singer, but what a remarkable performer.
REDFORD: This is an incredible story. I'm casting the little girl. I'm sitting in a hotel room four nights before we're going to film. And it's not cast. I'm really depressed. And I'm surfing the TV and suddenly this face comes on, this angelic face, just beautiful angelic face.
[Clip of Jackie Evancho singing.]
REDFORD: I get the casting agent and say find this person. I don't know where she is.
STEPHANOPOULOS: She won the lottery.
REDFORD: She won the lottery. Shows up three days later. She was so real and so lovely. Well, you'll see when she comes on. That was a joy. One of those wonderful risks that works.
Apart from being born with that voice, I don't think Miss Evancho got anything just by being lucky. If anyone won the lottery in this exchange, it was Mr. Redford by having her in his movie. It would have been a more interesting film if it concentrated on her and her reactions to having a father accused of murder and going on the run to clear himself. I would have had her instrumental in persuading the radical who could clear him to come forward.
In an interview about acting in the film, Miss Evancho talked about how difficult it was to cry on cue. To the best of my knowledge, there was no scene in the movie that had her crying and I'm thinking the scene didn't make the final cut. Natalie Portman in an interview she gave looking back on making The Professional at the age of eleven also talked about her difficulty in crying on cue. I think Ms. Portman's interview(s) are instructive for young actors. Here are the youtube links:
Natalie Portman "Léon" Interview PART 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vq3Detj2Pys
Natalie Portman "Léon" Interview Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mTAodEOe48
Background to scripts
On the Sunday before Labor Day, 2013, I was sitting on my patio in Las Vegas deciding what to work on while I listened to my compilation of Miss Evancho’s singing. Sometime before, I had read of her mother, Mrs. Lisa Evancho, saying that they were looking for another movie for her daughter to do, and I’d been mulling over a plot about a deprived young woman escaping her bleak life by having her talent for singing discovered – The Jackie Evancho Story if she’d not been so lucky as to have the family she does.
I started writing Angel and in four days, one of which I took off from work, it was done, by far the most inspired script I’ve ever written. There are now seventy-two revised versions, but most of them are only minor changes of dialogue and such. The only major revision was having one of the characters early in the script discover her at the graveyard where her mentors later go to look for her when she and her brother are missing, explaining how they knew the children might be there.
I set it in Pittsburgh for the family’s convenience and because Pittsburgh’s weary industrial look is a perfect backdrop. I put the script and related material on my website, www.brucemacintyre.info, and sent a letter and some scenes to the Evancho’s home address that I found on the web and got the package returned with an “Unforwardable” stamp. They’d moved. I sent emails and then letters to her agent at William Morris Endeavor and her manager at Align, an email to the Evancho family website, and a letter to a P.O. box associated with the family, and received no response which was understandable and, from experience, expected.
I had mentioned in my communications that the gritty feel of the script might work for her career the way “The Professional” had for the career of Natalie Portman. In an interview, Miss Portman said, “By starting out as an adult in a film for grown-ups, I think it eased my transition into adult acting more because people have been looking at me as like a woman sort of since I was a little girl.” Another thing I mentioned was my feeling that there are parts in the film that could be played by her siblings. I find them delightful in the video clips of her life, seeing and hearing their dreams and watching them grow.
As Angel had not inspired any response, I began thinking that a script with a change of tone might be useful. The video clip of an interview with her at home where she appeared to be a fairly accomplished archer had set me thinking that making her a female Robin Hood in medieval England might be an interesting twist. But somehow violence, even for a just reason, didn’t seem to fit with her character and as I worked on the plot it evolved so that archery was out and she was a gentle soul (and secret princess, heir to the throne) that uses her singing to invoke the magic with the animals that saves the day.
I got a about half-way through another script, a science-fiction piece, but I found the monsters rather uninteresting and little way to involve Miss Evancho’s singing, so I’ve put it aside to let it percolate for a time.
The third script, The Little People, was conceived as a weird thriller involving a mafioso on the run who meets a leprechaun married to a princess of the magic little people of Hawaii, together foiling a dastardly plot by Adolph Hitler’s unknown son to create a terrorist incident involving the volcano Kilauea. I replaced the mafioso with Miss Evancho who’s magical singing makes the little people reveal themselves to her, and made a better script I believe.
More communications brought the same silence and I've submitted queries to agents in general with the same lack of response (WME, her agency, returned my letter by certified mail). My feeling is that if the Evancho family reads the scripts and feels intrigued with the possibilities, their contacts have a far better chance of attracting a producer. I should be a better sales-person, but for me it’s a chore while writing is a delight, and there’s only so much time.
In any case, I’m enjoying myself and looking forward to writing more scripts for her as she gets older, regardless of whether they go anywhere or not. I hope you enjoy some part of this lunacy.