Red carpet awaits Young @ Heart

By Kristina Tedeschi
Staff Writer

Published on January 11, 2008

The internationally known Young@Heart Chorus is about to become even more famous.

The documentary film "Young@Heart," based on the senior citizens chorus from Northampton, will be shown at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival later this month.

One of 121 films selected from a record 3,624 submissions, "Young@Heart" will be screened five times during the Spectrum: Documentary Spotlight portion of the festival, which runs from Jan. 17 through 27 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah.

Directed by British filmmaker Stephen Walker and produced by Sally George, the documentary shows chorus members in the weeks leading up to a new show, titled "Alive and Well." With help from chorus director Bob Cilman, who is also executive director of the Northampton Arts Council, the film shows members working hard learning six new songs for the show, from Sonic Youth's yell-inducing "Schizophrenia" to James Brown's euphoric "I Got You (I Feel Good)." Through watching the seniors during rehearsals, personal interviews and performances, the audience sees how, even through the shadows of failing health, the show must go on.

"Funny, poignant, and inspirational, Stephen Walker's intimate documentary demonstrates that the Young@Heart chorus only gets better with age," a blurb states on the Sundance Film Festival's Web site.

Fox Searchlight Pictures, a specialty film division of 20th Century Fox, bought the film and submitted it to Sundance. Nancy Utley, chief operating officer for Fox Searchlight, saw "Young@Heart" at the Los Angeles Film Festival last summer. "We just loved it," Utley told the Gazette in July.

The documentary has aired on television in Britain and Ireland, and on stations in Italy and Japan. "Young@Heart" won the Best Art Documentary and Best of 2007 prizes at the Rose D'Or Festival in Lucerne, Switzerland, and the audience award for best international feature at the L.A. Film Festival.

The film is slated to be released to movie theaters in the spring. Previews for "Young@Heart" are appearing in some cities before other Fox Searchlight films now in theaters, like "Juno," Cilman said.

"I know it happened in Rochester, N.Y., because my mother called me," he said.

Cilman says he will travel to the festival with chorus members Jeanne Hatch, Dora Morrow and Steve Martin.

Hatch, of Chicopee, is looking forward to the trip, she says.

"I'm an admirer of Robert Redford, and I hope he'll be there," she said when reached at home.

So what does Hatch think about Young @ Heart's rising fame?

"To be honest, I don't give it a lot of thought," she said with a laugh. The biggest change for her has been the frequency of overseas visits, she says. As a member of the chorus for nine years, Hatch says she's been on 16 trips to other countries. A few weeks ago, the chorus returned from France, where they gave 13 sold-out performances, she said.

Hatch said they were treated wonderfully in France, and were given beautiful food.

"The desserts were so wonderful people took photographs of them," she said. But, she points out, "It's work, obviously - you know, we're there to perform."