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An icon of the age was turned into musical Evita, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's 1979 masterpiece. It chronicled how Eva Peron, a graspingly ambitious Buenos Aires actress, born illegitimate, became the First Lady of her nation when her husband was elected President.
But though she lived fast, she died at the age of just 33. In the post-Diana age, the story of the cult of celebrity that formed around her and turned her into her country's spiritual leader; amplified by her early death, has even larger ironic resonances.
Now it is revived in a spectacular new production that returns the show to the West End exactly 20 years after the original closed. That made a star of Elaine Paige, and the new show launches Argentinian Elena Roger.
Physically slight, she's a transfixing presence with more than just a touch of the star quality that she proudly sings of possessing.
Michael Grandage's lush and epic staging, played out in Christopher Oran's beautifully recreated courtyard of the Casa Rosada presidential palace, vividly brings the pulsing contradictions of the character to life.
While she's adored by the population, there's also the smirking presence of the narrator Che - re-conceived for this production as an everyman narrator; played by Matt Rawle, not the Che Guevara of the original, who Eva never met - to remind us of her craved pursuit of power and the powerful.
With choreographer Rob Ashford providing a gorgeous tapestry of continuous movement of waltzes and tangos, Lloyd Webber's best score has been given new, Latin-inflected orchestrations that make dazzling melodies like 'I'd Be Surprisingly Good For You', 'High Flying Adored' and 'Buenos Aires' freshly powerful. Eva Peron lives again, and will do so for some time to come.
Thanks to Gregor for forwarding this review
© The Express
