Actress travels 150 miles to save Evita after two stars fall ill
When not one but two Eva Peróns became ill in Leicester, there was only one place to call — Middlesbrough.
Jessica Daley answered the plea from a Leicester theatre on Saturday, making the 150-mile journey from her home in Teesside to fill in as Perón in a production of Evita.
The Curve Theatre had desperately tried to save the evening performance after both its lead, Martha Kirby, and her regular understudy, Chumisa Dornford-May, pulled out due to illness.
The theatre’s revival puts even more pressure on the lead role, which is one of the most demanding in musical theatre, with a camera following the lead actress and large images projected above the stage.
Only on late Saturday afternoon was the theatre able to announce that “having explored all possible options” after the loss of the two Evitas, the evening show would go ahead.
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Given the complexity of the staging, Daley performed some of the show from the side of the stage, at a lectern. During other parts, including the songs A New Argentina and Don’t Cry for Me Argentina, she was fully immersed and moved around on stage.
About five hours later, the theatre called her a “diamond” for saving the show. The Curve shared a picture of her “receiving a well-deserved standing ovation”, following the two-hour evening performance.
Although theatre show producers have contingency plans for most casting mishaps, losing two Evitas is a rare problem. There is arguably even more pressure on the understudy’s understudy if both Evitas have been praised by critics.
The musical, created by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice in the late 1970s, focuses on Perón, the actress, activist and first lady of Argentina, who died in 1952.
Kirby had been praised by The Times critic in December for her “naive, ambitious, steely and, briefly, touching vulnerable” Evita, and for “nailing” the show’s most famous song, Don’t Cry for Me Argentina.
The intended understudy, Dornford-May, had also been praised for her original role as a mistress of Perón’s husband, the late Argentinian president, Juan Perón.
The revival by the Curve’s artistic director, Nikolai Foster, garnered a four-star review. After stepping into Perón’s Salvatore Ferragamo shoes to acclaim in Leicester on Saturday, Daley sais on social media: “A moment. Lord,” with a crying face emoji.
Daley, who has previously performed as Evita on an international tour in 2019, adds her name to a growing roll call of understudies who have ensured that the show will go on.
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In his early career in the 1960s, the actor Sir Anthony Hopkins stood in for Laurence Olivier at the National Theatre. That theatre’s current artistic director, Rufus Norris, had to turn understudy five years ago, when show’s leading man pulled out 30 minutes before the start.
One understudy, Mark Oxtoby, admitted “bawling” with happiness on stage during one song after stepping in at the last minute to play Doc Brown at the opening night of the West End musical Back to the Future.
In the crowd that first night in 2021 was the American actor, Christopher Lloyd, who played Brown in the original film.
140min
To January 13, curveonline.co.uk
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