The Essence of Eva documentary – Eva Cassidy Web Site

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The much-anticipated feature documentary The Essence of Eva is making appearances at film festivals around the world, delighting longtime fans of the late Maryland “songbird” and creating new Eva enthusiasts with every screening. Their website describes The Essence of Eva as “Featuring unheard songs and exclusive archive footage… a portrait of legendary singer Eva Cassidy from the perspective of her parents, family and friends.” They received development funding from Screen Ireland.

Independent filmmakers Malcolm Willis and Alex Fegan began work on their Eva Cassidy documentary in early 2020, but the worldwide COVID pandemic intervened, and the project took much longer to complete than they expected. Interviews with Eva’s family and friends in Maryland and Washington DC were only the beginning. Over the next several years, Malcolm and Alex traveled to Iceland, Nova Scotia, California, and as far as Maui in Hawaii to film interviews with over 30 people, including music superstars Sting and Mick Fleetwood. These interviews are supplemented in the film by archival footage of Eva Cassidy from the 1980s and 1990s. The filmmakers now consider the pandemic delays as a blessing, because new material was constantly turning up. Editing the film down to a length of approximately 82 minutes was a giant, painful challenge.

The documentary’s world premiere took place at the Galway Film Fleadh in Ireland, followed by screenings at the Internationale Hofer Filmtage (Hof International Film Festival) in Hof, Bavaria, and at the prestigious Vancouver International Film Festival in British Columbia, Canada, where it received the “Audience Award” in its category. The film was also nominated for Best Documentary at the 2026 Irish Film and Television Awards [IFTA].

The United States premiere will be at FilmFest DC in Eva’s hometown of Washington DC, on April 22nd and 23rd, 2026, at 8:30 PM at the Regal Gallery Place theater in Washington, DC. This will be Eva’s family’s first opportunity to see the film on a real movie screen They have, of course, seen it on a small screen. Her sister Anette told me, “We just loved it, we thought that it really told Eva’s story. My parents loved it, this is what they wanted from the beginning, a documentary. So so happy this is finally coming about.”

As a preview to the documentary screening, critic Alona Wartofsky returned to the Washington City Paper to write about “The Essence of Eva.”

Filming the Documentary

Alex and Malcolm with Eva’s parents in Shady Side, Maryland

Documentary filming with music executive Tom Goldfogle in Chuck Brown Memorial Park

Documentary filming with Mary Ann Redmond, who was a mentor to Eva in the Washington DC music scene

Filming in Iceland — Malcolm and Alex filming in Iceland

Source material used in the documentary (follow this link for the full story, and it’s a darned good one)

Malcolm and Alex in Berlin for the first market screening of “The Essence of Eva”

World Premiere in Galway, Ireland

GALWAY FILM FLEADH! Galway was full of film folk. Webmaster Laura Bligh and her sister Vivien Bligh traveled to Ireland to attend the world premiere of “The Essence of Eva.”

“The Essence of Eva” in the Galway Film Fleadh program

Photo by Malcolm Willis, who disobeyed the instruction to turn his phone off during the film.

A Q&A session followed the screening. Laura had the opportunity to tell the audience that Eva’s parents are very pleased with the film.
Photo by Shawna McGowan

Filmmakers Malcolm Willis and Alex Fegan answering audience questions after the screening

The IFTA awards are the most prestgious in Ireland, so this nomination was very exciting

PODCAST INTERVIEW: Filmmaker Malcolm Willis is interviewed in this podcast by Gemma Creagh. (The podcast is also found elsewhere, but it’s all the same interview.)