Actress-mom takes center stage in immersive ‘Evita’ at Roxy’s Downtown
After auditioning for the Roxy’s Downtown production of “Evita,” Tara Shaffer convinced herself she’d rather have the real-life role of Mom than of Eva Peron.
Wanting to prioritize her family during the waning days of summer vacation, Shaffer initially declined the offer from Roxy’s artistic director Rick Bumgardner and music director Simon Hill to play the title role.
“Rick and Simon and Roxy’s have been so wonderful to craft a schedule that’s left me able to spend that time with (my family) and be well-rehearsed,” she said. “I’m just incredibly grateful they’ve worked with me, and I have this opportunity, because it’s truly a delight.”
“Evita” opens Friday at Roxy’s and continues through Sept. 27.
In the middle of Shaffer’s audition song, Bumgardner said, he leaned over to Hill and whispered what he thought of her playing Evita.
“I think his response was, ‘OMG, OMG, OMG,’” Bumgardner recalled. “The cards just unfolded in front of us. She’s amazing in the role.”
Shaffer, who is “almost 44,” said the biggest challenge was playing Eva Peron from age 15 until her death from cancer at 33.
“That’s a big span there,” she said. “Her emotional growth and everything she went through as a young woman, all the people she met and how she was used by all the people in her life and how that crafted how she built her own empire in Argentina.”
Shaffer, whose Wichita theater credits include time as a regular at Mosley Street Melodrama, productions at the former Crown Uptown, and in the chorus for Music Theatre Wichita’s “Evita” in 2000, did research on the role, including reading an unauthorized biography and a book by composers Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice where they explain the thought process in putting the seven-time Tony Award-winning musical together.
“She doesn’t see herself as a bad person, and I don’t particularly either,” Shaffer said of Argentina’s first lady. “She’s very misunderstood and certainly a product of all the circumstances she was brought into.”
Shaffer’s research was just part of the digging that the “Evita” cast and creatives did in preparation for the musical, Bumgardner said.
“The research on this woman has been nothing short of amazing,” he said. “It’s been so much fun to get to learn about her life and examine her and read what people said about her.”
Bumgardner even got insight from his cul-de-sac neighbors, natives of Argentina.
“She is still so revered there it’s not even funny,” he said.
Zach Garraway, who plays Che, the musical’s narrator and Eva’s confidante, said he wasn’t familiar with “Evita” when he auditioned.
“It’s obviously great music and some of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s best,” he said. “It’s very interesting and very different than other productions.”
Billy Green, who plays Juan Peron, said he liked the staging of “Evita,” where an 11-member choir sits throughout the house at Roxy’s during the entire show.
“It’s very unique,” he said. “I think it’s going to be really interesting sharing the stage with the audience, intermingling with them and breaking the whole fourth wall throughout.”
Bumgardner said that the staging is similar to Roxy’s “Hunchback of Notre Dame” last September, where characters are introduced in the crowd and appear on stage. Only Eva, Juan and Che remain on stage, he said.
“Our choir members are in the house,” he said. “They are sitting at tables with audience members, so the audience will be totally immersed in the story and the citizens of Argentina.
‘EVITA’
When: Through Sept. 27; 7:30 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 p.m. Saturdays (Aug. 30, Sept. 13 and 27)
Where: Roxy’s Downtown, 412 ½ E. Douglas
Tickets: From $28.57, at roxysdowntown.com or 316-265-4400