Evita (Dir/J.Lloyd) -OAT 2019 / Barbican ‘20 / Palladium ‘25

I can't see why they wouldn't run it at RPOAT again if social distancing is still in place – same set as JCS, ALW may be generous with the rights, they can probably adapt the choreo? 

Was just thinking this the other day, and I really hope so!

Funnily enough, they had an open air version of Evita in Brazil earlier this year. Based on the style of the initial marketing material, I thought it’d be the Jamie Lloyd production. But the costumes and sets were quite different on the photos of the actual show.

I was really hoping for this to come back, as I thought it was great at Regent’s Park.

That's harsh. I rated it well above their Carousel or Legally Blonde and it was well received generally. I'd be happy to see it at the Barbican (or indeed any musical - it's a lovely venue!) 

It was a lot better than those, I grant you.

But it wasn’t a patch on JCS which preceded it, which is unusual for me to feel because Evita is one of my favourite musicals.

It was all a bit too Lloyd-y for me. I liked the bit where Che got tarred and feathered, but the cast left me extremely disappointed.

I caught it about 15 years ago on a wet night in Hull with a very bad Che and tired Marti Webb. The whole thing looked very tired and dated. It wasn't the best introduction to it but it would be interesting to see if it could work with the right cast

I was excited about that, even planning to travel abroad for it, until I saw what they did with it. I loved Grandage's 2006 revival but imposing its script and orchestrations on the Hal Prince production does not work, and certainly not if they're not going to redo Larry Fuller's choreography to accommodate those changes (so the whole aristocracy movements in Buenos Aires did not gel at all with the music as they did originally). The shoehorned You Must Love Me in that international production had no direction whatsoever as it was not overseen by Prince, so Eva just stood there singing the song at the audience in her Waltz dress and it was weird.

You've misunderstood my post - sorry if I was unclear! I'm talking about the recent international revival of the Hal Prince production...which they marketed as being exactly as the Prince production was but, in fact, wasn't, because they imposed the revival script and orchestrations on it. So bits of the show that were changed were out of sync with the original staging.

I also loved the 2006 revival and thought YMLM worked beautifully there, as you say. But in the Prince 'revival' (which is difficult to call Prince because he didn't oversee it at all), the way they shoehorned it in, it did not.

In the Prince revival case, this was before he passed away. He knew about it and wanted it to come to Broadway but was totally hands off and did not oversee it at all. Which meant bits of the show that did not exist when he did the original (such as 'You Must Love Me' & the new speeches during 'Buenos Aires') did not have his input and I think they just got randoms to deal with it...and the result was not successful. I can't remember whether Larry Fuller got involved or not (someone did tell me when I asked but I've forgotten), but I suspect he didn't either, because again the choreography did not work with the new ending of 'Buenos Aires' and I can't believe Larry Fuller would have served that up.

I think Fuller was involved in the international tour. He was certainly involved in a staging of the original where they had to use the new orchestrations as he voiced disquiet about that in a youtube chat that's probably still up. It was a chat between Fuller and original Magaldi and Mistress Mark Ryan and Siobhan McCarthy and a number of Evas. Really fascinating, though rambling as it's a chat amongst friends/colleagues. I'm afraid the stand out memorable moment was Susannah Fellows remembering how during her entire time within the company as Ensemble and understudy Eva, Elaine Paige never once spoke to her. Can that be true? Brutal to say it in that chat - and brutal if true. She did say, 'a lot of pressure must have been on her', in mitigation, but still... sad to hear.  Do all Evas have to go so Method?!  Lol

I assume this is another pandemic casualty now gone forever. The revival (of the Hal Prince original) did amazing business at the Sydney Opera House and in Melbourne 2018 and I've often wondered of it might work here, say at ENO. I know David Ian was keen but the rights weren't available.

At least 25. My colleague and her husband worked that tour as stage management for over a year post uni, and she’s been a qualified solicitor for over 20 years since! They’re still in contact with Marti and most of the cast though…