Tyrone Huntley, Dan Partridge and Martha Kirby in Evita at Curve Leicester. Picture: Marc Brenner
Evita continues at Curve Leicester until 13 January 2023.
Star rating: three stars ★ ★ ★ ✩ ✩
Andrew Lloyd Webber has had a pretty good year, all things considered. While his (Bad) Cinderella sadly lived up to its reworked title, his classics have seen a great deal of love, with a brilliant production of Jesus Christ Superstar currently touring the country, a soaring concert version of Love Never Dies at Drury Lane over the summer and Jamie Lloyd’s stunning reimagining of Sunset Boulevard currently making Nicole Scherzinger the talk of London town.
Also back from the Webber catalogue to entertain us is Evita, a Curve production playing in Leicester over the festive period. With lyrics from Tim Rice, the musical started out as a rock opera concept album, before evolving into a full production that made a household name of Elaine Paige (and Patti LuPone across the pond) and created one of the best roles for women in musical theatre.
Narrated by “voice of the people” Che (played by Tyrone Huntley), the biographical story tells of the life of Eva Duarte (Martha Kirby), a young ambitious Argentinian woman who longs for a better life and a career as an actress. After meeting singer-songwriter Agustin Magaldi (Dan Partridge), Eva realises she has significant power and influence over men, and soon begins to climb the social ladder as her attachments grow more significant, leading her to becoming the second wife of president Juan Perón (Gary Milner). Her natural charm and sway gain her affection from the Argentinian people, and as her humanitarian philanthropy makes her their spiritual leader, her secret battles with an undisclosed illness threaten to overshadow everything she’s built.
Tim Rice has said that Evita is his favourite of Lloyd Webber’s scores, and it definitely has its standouts (the political fire and drive of ‘A New Argentina’ and ‘Don’t Cry for Me Argentina’, and the quiet beauty of ‘You Must Love Me’ and ‘Another Suitcase in Another Hall’). It is however one of Webber’s more repetitive scores with more than his usual amount of melodic recycling going on, and there are more than a few whispers of Joseph and Jesus Christ Superstar in it. But when it’s good, it’s great, and the highs it delivers are thrilling. It’s a sung-through show, a format which isn’t always the most accessible to audiences, and a lot of concentration and focus is required to fully glean the story from Rice’s lyrics alone. It does however do a great job of painting a multi-dimensional study of a complex woman, formidable and flawed, and makes Eva Duarte de Perón a captivating focus for a musical.
Unfortunately, this focus is somewhat lost in Curve’s production, which takes a contemporary minimalist approach and ultimately muddies the narrative, seemingly unsure of the tale it’s trying to tell and where its focus lies, and prioritising trendiness over storytelling. As a result, Eva’s identity and ambition don’t come across as strongly as they should, making her journey less engaging.
Director Nikolai Foster once again adopts a very industrial feel, much like his Billy Elliot and A Chorus Line, which may have been initially striking but now feels sparse and soulless, and the bare set (Michael Taylor) of scaffolding and a wheeled staircase is particularly underwhelming and clunky. Lighting design (Joshie Harriette) may be powerful at the right times, but it also highlights just how vast the Curve stage is when it isn’t used fully, ultimately making the production feel thin and unsatisfying. The show also utilises live video which appears on a large screen, which will inevitably draw comparisons to Jamie Lloyd’s Sunset Boulevard currently playing in London. While both shows would have been in development for a significant amount of time and any similarity must be coincidental, the technique feels far less successful here, detracting from the narrative rather than adding anything to it.
Performances are strong, which help to counteract the shortcomings of the production itself; Kirby sings the score to perfection, the highlight undoubtedly being ‘Don’t Cry for Me Argentina’ which is stunning. Kirby is a stronger singer than an actress, and doesn’t always convey the grit and enigmatic power that made Eva such an influential figure, although some of this is down to the way Foster directs the story.
Milner makes for an authoritative Peron, and Huntley delivers his usual excellent standard as Che, brilliantly likeable throughout and putting his strong voice to good use. Chumisa Dornford-May also stands out as Peron’s mistress, making ‘Another Suitcase in Another Hall’ her own and hopefully paving the way to a great career for her. Partridge also makes a great Magaldi, full of Elvis-swagger.
In scaling things back and using devices that get in the way of the story, Curve’s Evita results in Eva’s story and character being lost, and no amount of video tricks or dynamic lighting can make up for that. The score will always sound good, and there are certainly elements to enjoy here, but most of that comes from the material and the performances rather than the production itself.
Rob Bartley