Angelo Unwritten
Producer: Alice Stone
In Production
ANGELO UNWRITTEN is a documentary portrait of Angelo Santiago, who just turned 18 and can now, finally, decide for himself where he will live and who his family will be. When he was six, the state of Massachusetts removed Angelo from his mother’s care and placed him in foster care. After a series of group homes and placements, Angelo was finally welcomed into a loving home with foster parents Phil and Laura. He was twelve years old. They became a family and in time, Angelo came to call his foster parents Mom and Dad.
But at age seventeen, Angelo’s caseworkers decided to end this foster placement. Against the express wishes of Angelo, Laura and Phil, the state removed him from their home, and put him in an emergency placement. Angelo ended up in a lock down facility for juveniles with substance abuse issues, simply because that was the place with a bed available. Laura and Phil pursued every legal avenue to try to get Angelo returned to them, but he remained in that facility for seven long months, until he aged out at eighteen.
ANGELO UNWRITTEN opens at midnight on Angelo’s birthday. The second he turned 18, Angelo walked out of the foster care facility and returned “home” with Laura and Phil. The documentary follows Angelo as he begins his independent life. He’s living with Laura and Phil, but it’s a tense home environment. Laura and Phil very much wanted Angelo to complete high school, and for now, he’s dropped out. They’re pursuing legal remedies for the harm they think Angelo suffered by being removed from their care, but ironically, Angelo doesn’t support that. He’s not interested in dwelling on the past, and he’s not entirely convinced Laura and Phil really tried to get him back. He defends his caseworkers when Laura attacks them. They disagree about why he was “taken.” But they’re a family, once again, and ANGELO UNWRITTEN will chronicle the next couple of years as Angelo forges into his independent life.
Intimate video diary footage shot by Angelo, Laura and Phil will combine with professionally filmed scenes of Angelo with friends, with Laura and Phil, and on visits to his biological relatives, some of whom he hasn’t seen in years but remains in contact with via the Internet.
The visual style of Angelo’s story takes inspiration from his passion for hip hop. Angelo will “narrate” scenes by co-writing original raps with an accomplished rap music producer. Some of Angelo’s raps will be topical, such as a rap about being a Latino kid with white parents in a white neighborhood. But much of his rapping will serve the function of traditional voice-over narration, providing exposition, explanation, and commentary.
Once they age out of the system, there is very little support for former foster children. How can society help make their transition to adulthood successful? By focusing on the story of one child, ANGELO UNWRITTEN raises broader issues regarding foster care in the US, including the issue of cross-racial placements, or in this case, white foster parents for a Latino child.