Evita – The Curve, Leicester

Music: Andrew Lloyd-Webber

Lyrics: Tim Rice

Director: Nikolai Foster

Oh, what a show we have at the Curve Theatre in Nikolai Foster’s stunning new version of Evita. The production rips apart every preconception you might have about the staging or interpretation of the Rice / Lloyd Webber classic and looks at the show afresh, giving it a contemporary feel and increased relevance in today’s political landscape. Foster brings a level of creative imagination to the production that many can only dream of, yet when you see how he has approached some of the scenes it seems inevitable that they should be done this way.

This is Evita stripped back, with the characters given the space to tell their stories unencumbered by traditional scenery. Instead, Michael Taylor’s design gives us a large movable staircase and a girder-like bridge that descends from on high, steel lighting towers and massive banks of lighting, all of which allow the production to give the feel of a TV studio from time to time. In fact, video plays a large part in the production with Martha Kirby’s Eva being followed around by a camera and visible on screen much of the time – a nod towards the huge part television and increasingly social media video can play in creating and maintaining a person’s reputation these days, the equivalent in Peron’s time being radio.

Kirby sparkles like the diamond Eva is in the title role, bringing a freshness to her performance. Gone are the elegant gowns and tight blonde bun, replaced by power suits and often a loose brunette hairstyle (like everything else, Edd Lindley’s costume designs discard the traditional and brings the feel into the 21^st century). Kirby has a wonderful clarity to her voice that allows every word to be heard – essential in a sung-through show if you are to have any chance of understanding the story. The pinnacle of every Evita has to be Eva’s Don’t Cry for Me Argentina and here Kirby does not disappoint, with a delivery that is both vulnerable and designed to win over the most sceptical Argentinian voter.

Opposite Kirby, we have Gary Milner as Peron, with another strong performance as the man with huge ambitions, happy to hang onto the coattails of a charismatic and equally ambitious woman to achieve them. Milner is in good voice here too, showing his own vulnerability with a particularly good version of You Must Love Me with Kirby’s Eva leading into his She is a Diamond, bringing a realisation that alongside the authoritarian dictator he is, he’s also a man whose wife is dying.

The story is driven along by Tyron Huntley’s Che who plays the role of narrator, observing everything and asking the questions the Perons would prefer were kept quiet. It’s another huge role, carrying the production through as much as Eva and Peron do and it’s one that finds Huntley climbing onto balconies and popping up everywhere, alongside what is a massive sing – and Huntley approaches it with conviction and excellent delivery.

Adam Murray’s choreography is high energy and brings the stage to life. Joshie Harriette’s lighting plays a key part in creating the feel of the production, sparkling alongside Eva’s career rather than setting like the sun when she dies. Great stuff.

It’s fresh, high-energy and contemporary with a strong emphasis on story-telling and characterisations and a real emphasis on creating settings and moments that will resonate with a modern audience – setting the Waltz for Eva and Che as a TV interview show is a stroke of genius.

With a surprise at every turn, it’s a production that will almost certainly divide opinion but if the reaction of the audience on press night is anything to go by, where the entire audience seemed to rise as one for a standing ovation when the curtain fell, the Curve has another hit on its hands.

Runs until 13 January 2024