“Evita,” the musical/rock opera with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice, opens for a four-day run on Thursday, May 2, at George C. Marshall High School.
Performances begin at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, May 2-4, with a matinee on Sunday, May 5, at 2 p.m. in the Marshall Auditorium at 7731 Leesburg Pike, just inside the Beltway.
More than 40 students from Vienna, McLean, Great Falls and Falls Church have roles, and a children’s choir from Wolftrap Elementary School is also a part of the production. They are accompanied by a live musical ensemble.
“EVITA” BRINGS to life the persona of Eva Duarte Peron, wife of former Argentine dictator, Juan Peron. The production follows her rise from a life of poverty and insignificance to one of prestige and fame.
On the way to the top, she uses, abuses and seduces men of power, growing more glamorous and mesmerizing with each triumph.
Driven by a desire to help the dispossessed but hypnotized by the wealth and power of her husband’s presidency, she is seen by some as “Santa Evita,” and by others as a tramp and tyrant.
Evita’s death from ovarian cancer at the age of 33 inspires her unofficial sainthood in the eyes of the working poor of Argentina.
Marshall students in leading roles include Paloma Guzman of Great Falls as Evita; Yousef Sultani of Falls Church as Che; Peter Van Valkenberg of Vienna as Peron; David Winkler of Vienna as Magaldi, and Miranda Pennington of Vienna as the Mistress. Lauren Friedman is stage manager and Ian Campbell is technical director.
More than 40 other actors and actresses from Marshall have roles as peasants, aristocracy, military, and revolutionaries of Argentina in the early 1950s.
Choreography is directed by Kristin Fieseler with musical direction by Mary Anne East and Bryan Baldwin. The director is Marshall theater teacher Mark Krikstan.
SONGS IN “EVITA” include “Don’t Cry for Me,” “Another Suitcase,” “Art of the Possible,” “A New Argentina,” and “High Flying Adored.”
Marshall High School theater students won first place at the Virginia High School League Drama Tournament in 2000 and 2001.
In January, they won first place in the Liberty District Theater Festival with a production of “La Bete.”
Tickets for “Evita” are available at the door. Adults are $8 and students are $5. For more information, call 703-714-5400.