The musical follows the rise of Evita from her humble beginnings as a young girl in poverty-stricken Argentina to her meteoric rise to fame as an actress and eventual marriage to Juan Perón. Along the way, she uses her beauty, charm, and ambition to climb the social ladder and become a powerful political figure.
Evita is a deeply divisive figure in Argentina, beloved by many for her advocacy on behalf of the poor and working-class, and reviled by others for her perceived opportunism and manipulation of the system. Her untimely death at the age of 33 only added to her mystique and cemented her place in Argentine popular culture.
The musical, which features music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice, premiered in London's West End in 1978 and on Broadway in 1979. It has since been revived numerous times, adapted into a feature film starring Madonna in 1996, and remains a beloved classic of the musical theater canon.