The OLD Philosopher – John M. Miller
In 1978, the great musical composer Andrew Lloyd Webber launched another highly successful musical in London. Evita evolved out of a chance visit to Argentina by Lloyd Webber. There he encountered the story of Eva Duarte Peron. He said he first saw her captivating countenance on an Argentine postage stamp, and from there his interest rapidly grew. The rest is West End, Broadway, and world musical history.
The lyricist for Lloyd Webber’s early productions was Tim Rice. Evita was their third major collaboration. When the vastly creative composer returned to London, he and Tim Rice worked out the story line for a new musical-as-opera, which is essentially what many of Lloyd Webber’s recent shows are. The plot of the musical is based on biographies of Eva and Juan Peron that were written shortly after Peron was removed from the power of the Argentine presidency.
The narrator for Evita is a man identified simply as Che. In the opening scene, because of his beret with a glaring red star on the front, perhaps we are to assume he is a Che Guevara-like figure. We recall that Fidel Castro’s fellow Marxist Che Guevara was instrumental in the Cuban revolution. And after all, Guevara was born in Argentina.
Eva Duarte and the theatrical Che both came from impoverished working class backgrounds. Throughout the opera, Che expresses serious doubts about the authenticity and honesty of Ms. Duarte Peron. Perhaps that is because Evita turned into a fascist rather than a Marxist, if we are meant to infer that “Che” is a Marxist. Had Argentina turned communist, Che might have been far more attracted than repelled by Eva Peron.
I have seen the Madonna movie version of Evita three or four times. I have a CD of the movie sound track which I have listened to dozens of times. But I never fully appreciated the historical impact of Evita until I saw it performed live on stage.
Recently I went to see Evita with friends. I was highly engrossed mentally by the entire experience, although in a totally unanticipated way. I thought I would just be seeing a famous operatic stage production. What I saw was an astonishing re-enactment of countless contemporary stories by analogy that we see on the nightly cable news channels.
I confess to being a person who is transported to another realm of reality by the theater. That is especially true of musicals. Unfortunately, neither my elderly ears nor brain are able to comprehend and retain every word of every song of every musical I have ever seen performed anywhere. Up until I saw her on stage in Hilton Head, Evita ---the theatrical character and the entire musical production --- have always been a bit muddled in my mind.
The movie (and the stage production) move very swiftly from one scene to another. With effort, those quick transitions can be properly filed mentally. Nonetheless it is the rapidity of the lyrics which are the real challenge.
This time, seeing Evita in a live performance, I finally understood the essential nuances of what I believe Messrs. Lloyd Webber and Rice were intending to convey about their title character. In the live production about Eva Peron, I believe at last “I got it,” to use a common contemporary phrase.
For me, seeing Shakespeare performed on stage has always been better than seeing Shakespeare in a movie, and a Shakespeare movie is always better than merely reading Shakespeare. I suppose it has something to do with cerebral synapses and visual stimuli, or some such thing.
However, when listening to the soloists and chorus on stage, I still missed far too many of the actual lyrics to catch every hint of what Lloyd Webber and Rice are telling us. It was only when I Googled the lyrics the day after the performance that I was convinced my completely captivated initial impression from the opening scene, with Evita’s coffin, to the last scene, once again with her coffin, was correct.
The story of Eva Peron’s arrival on the world scene was a super-nova which ran from the mid-1940s and her marriage to President Juan Peron of Argentina to her death from cancer in mid-1952. Evita first hit the stage in London in 1978, and it came to New York in 1980. It has been performed thousands of times the world over since then. But to me its lyrics seem to be even more apropos for the current situation in the United States of America in 2017 and 2018 than for Argentina or anywhere else at any other time. It is absolutely uncanny. Let us therefore examine how this revelation came to its unanticipated fruition.
The Lyrics of Evita
Naturally, there are hundreds of lines in the lyrics of Evita. We shall look at only a few of them. But these particular lines highlight the similarities between a female political novice who burst upon the scene of her nation’s in a political malaise to another political novice who burst upon his nation in a similar malaise. It was this amazing déjà vu that struck me with such force in watching and listening to the opera on stage.
Oh What a Circus (Che)
After Che has witnessed the deep sorrow of the mourners who have come to file past the casket of the controversial deceased thirty-three-year-old in the opening scene, he disgustedly sings the following:
Oh what a circus, oh what a show
Argentina has gone to town
Over the death of an actress called Eva Peron….
But who is this Santa Evita?
Why all this howling, hysterical sorrow
What kind of goddess has lived among us?
How will we ever get by without her?
Show business has kept us alive
Since seventeen October 1945
[the date Juan Peron came to power]
But the star has gone, the glamour’s worn thin
That’s a pretty bad state for a state to be in
Instead of government we have a stage
Instead of ideas, a prima donna’s rage
Instead of help we were given a crowd
She didn’t say much, but she said it loud
Evita’s husband Juan Peron, an army colonel, seized power in a military coup. In the early stages of his presidency, he promised to raise the standard of living of Argentina’s poor, who were a large majority of the people. And he definitely was helpful to the lower classes. But as time went on, he seemed to reverse course, bowing to the wishes of the wealthy. Therefore he and his wife became constant centers of controversy.
I was just a boy when I first read about the Perons in the newspapers. I did not understand all the nuances of the reports, but I knew enough to understand that they were not popular with everyone in their country, and that they were as unpopular with at least half the people as they were thrilling to with the other half. After Juan Peron re-married, and attempted to duplicate the Evita magic show a few years later, I was old enough to realize that economic and political conditions were collapsing in Argentina. “Oh what a circus, oh what a show.”
I’d Be Surprisingly Good for You (Eva and Peron)
Toward the middle of the first act, Eva Duarte and Juan Peron met at a social function. The meeting was no accident; Eva carefully orchestrated it. She of course knows who he is, but he also knows who she is. She was a famous actress, and she had her own widely-followed radio show. After some initial conversation, she says to the handsome newly inaugurated President,
(Eva) – …But when you act, the thing you do affects us all
(Peron) – But when you act, you take us away from the squalor of the real world
Are you here on your own?
(Eva) Yes, oh yes
(Peron) So am I, what a fortunate coincidence
Maybe you’re my reward for my efforts here tonight
Eva) It seems crazy but you must believe
There’s nothing calculated, nothing planned
Please forgive me if I seem naïve
I would never want to force your hand
But please understand, I’d be good for you.
Historically, Juan Peron may have been one of those politicians who discovered that his spouse had more influence on the body politic than is ordinarily the case, and perhaps more than he wanted. But he also was shrewd enough to realize that Evita could become an increasingly important means of winning support for his autocratic policies. He knew a good thing when he saw it, and from the moment he first laid eyes on her, Peron knew Eva was, for him, a very good thing.
Eva is portrayed as being even more shrewd than her husband. She knew how to play him like a priceless Stradivarius. She appealed to his ego, and he was hooked. “But please understand, I’d be good for you.”
(Eva) - Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina
The most famous aria or song in Evita, is Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina. It was sung toward the end of the first act, and once again as a reprise toward the end of the second act.
In the first version, before she has won the hearts of millions of the Argentine populace, with great psychological cunning and emotional appeal, Eva sings to the adoring throng of peasants and workers,
It won’t be easy, you’ll think it strange
When I try to explain how I feel/
That I still need your love after all that I’ve done
You won’t believe me, all you will see is a girl you once knew
Although she’s dressed up to the nines
At sixes and sevens with you
Don’t cry for me, Argentina
The truth is I never left you
All through my wild days
My mad existence
I kept my promise, don’t keep your distance
But as for future, and as for fame
Though it seemed to the world they were all I desired
They are illusions, they’re not the solutions they promised to be
The answers were here all the time
I love you and I hope you love me
Eva Peron was a brilliant schemer who knew how to win the minds of an important percentage of the Argentines. She may have been even more manipulative of herself, believing that what she said and did was heartfelt and honest, even if much of it was self-serving and narcissistic. What the musical portrays is essentially what was in the news reports of the time and the historical summaries written after Eva died. She was a complex personality with many strengths and weaknesses, soaring talent and serious personality gaps. Evita of the Lloyd Webber-Rice musical possesses a strange cornucopia of frightened animal-alertness, but she seems incapable of genuine introspection.
Her pleas for support from her fellow citizens met with unparalleled enthusiasm from certain kinds of people and unrestrained animosity from others. Political pied pipers have that power - - - but also that unstable level of resistance to their own shortcomings.
Needy narcissists can never fully satiate their craving for adulation. The Lloyd Webber Evita is a captivating embodiment of that sardonic reality. “Don’t cry for me, Argentina…I love you and I hope you love me.”
(Che and the Workers) - And the Money Keeps Rolling In
(Chorus) – Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’
Rollin’ on out, rollin’ on out
(Che) – And the money keeps rolling out in all directions
To the poor, to the weak, to the destitute of all complexions
Now cynics claim a little of the cash has gone astray
But that’s not the point, my friends
When the money keeps rolling out you don’t keep books
You can tell you’ve done well by the happy grateful looks
Accountants only slow things down, figures get in the way
Never been a lady loved as much as Eva Peron
The theatrical Eva Peron established a charitable foundation. She said it was intended to benefit the poor and dispossessed, and it did that. Money flowed into it like water. But some of it also may have disappeared into her own coffers.
In the early stages of their ascendance to power, populist autocrats tend to be very generous to their most enthusiastic supporters from the body politic. It is a proven method for consolidating and expanding their grip on the levers of power.
When charismatic leaders make good things happen, many people are bound to be pleased. Those who are the most pleased may not care if clever leaders take measures which are of dubious propriety or are inimical to society. To the end of her short life, there were many Argentines who supported whatever Evita did, even if others were convinced everything about her was a total fraud.
Nearly always when autocracies are established, suspicious flows of funds become commonplace. If the power of the autocrat is weak, the kleptocracy may be held in check. When power is solidified, however, few citizens seem to care what happens to the money, so long as the streets are swept and the lights stay on. “When the money keeps rolling out you don’t keep books.”
Where Do We Go from Here?
Anyone who attends a performance of Evita and did not know that the historical Eva Peron died of cancer at a young age is made aware of her death in the opening scene. In the extended last scene, Eva is in the final assault of her malignancy, and she sings to the grief-stricken crowd,
Where do we go from here?
This isn’t where we intended to be
We had it all, you believed in me
I believed in you…
You must love me
You must love me
Those who see Evita and are not both drawn to and repelled by her and her husband have missed, I think, the thrust of what the music and lyrics of the opera are intended to convey. The historical and the theatrical Juan and Eva Peron were neither the embodiment of endless evil nor the incarnation of unambiguous good. Many of their inclinations, especially during the very early years of the Peron reign, were noble. They, particularly Eva, truly hoped to improve the lot of the Argentine poor. They meant to assist people who could not succeed in life without assistance.
The Peron problem is that power went to their heads. Like most narcissists, they needed constant adulation and affirmation. As their power coalesced, they began systematically to repress those who opposed them. They did not know how to use ordinary political compromises to deal equitably with their enemies; either they thrust them to the sidelines or they exterminated them.
It is imperative for all types of leaders that they be psychologically stable, mentally adept, and intuitively dependable. If any leader does not possess at least those three characteristics, that person almost certainly shall be a colossal failure over the long haul in a leadership role. Other traits may be of great assistance to them, but stability, ability, and dependability are absolute necessities. “Where do we go from here? This isn’t where we intended to be.”
Where Do WE Go from Here?
Evita is about Eva and Juan Peron from the mid-nineteen-forties to the early nineteen-fifties in Argentina. Together this historical Argentine duet have collectively been prophetically resurrected in an American Peron in the late twenty-teens.
Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice were prophets. When they collaborated on creating their musical time-piece, they had no idea they were predicting a similar future for America. The purpose of prophets is not and never has been to forecast what is going to happen. Rather it is to explain, usually in poetic form, what is happening at a particular period in the present or recent past. Thus it has been with the biblical prophets and with all other prophets in the ever-unfolding drama of history.
However, as Koheleth, or the Preacher, or Ecclesiastes says in the Bible, “There is nothing new in under the sun.”History and historical traumas and triumphs inevitably are resurrected in later times.
Unfortunately, most people believe the purpose of prophets is to predict the future. It is not. Rather, their purpose is to proclaim the proper interpretation of what is unfolding in the present. What do current events mean? Giving voice to that question is the purpose of the prophets.
That is why preachers use biblical prophecies to explain, by analogy, what is happening in their own time and place. Trying to predict the future, near or distant, is, at best, a risky business. Prophecies as “Predictions of the Future” are an exercise in futility. Prophecies as poetic summaries of “What’s Happening Now” are wonderfully evocative endeavors on behalf of enabling committed citizens to decide what path should be followed during a particular epoch.
The opera named Evita evolved only because a British composer happened to visit Argentina more than thirty years after Eva Peron had died, and twenty years after Juan Peron had been driven from power for the second time. Had Lloyd Webber not gone to Buenos Aires, the Perons would have rested in well-deserved obscurity from the central spotlight of world history. But their story is a great if also tragic story, and it took two extremely gifted artists to tell it so dramatically.
People who reach the pinnacle of power ill-equipped to govern almost always govern badly. Nothing in the background of either of the Perons, especially in their shaky psychological foundations, served them well in becoming the co-heads-of-state of the second-largest South American nation. Argentina, for most of the past half-millennium, has struggled to emerge from political instability and anomie, even though geopolitical nature has endowed it with extraordinary potential.
Nature also endowed America with great potential, and we have measured up to much of which we were capable. But in light of where we are in our unfolding as a uniquely powerful nation, we must ask ourselves: Where do we go from here?
John Miller is the pastor of The Chapel Without Walls on Hilton Head Island, SC. Other of his writings may be viewed at www.chapelwithoutwallshhi.org.