Liam Butler added much to his considerable reputation as a musical theatre director with a powerful and at times stunning production of Evita for one of the best musical societies in the country. Ballinrobe Musical Society have established an impressive reputation for innovative and big-production musicals. They are the first West of Ireland society to get the royalty to produce this show which a Dublin Teacher’s society brought to the Waterford Opera Festival some years ago.
The scale, scope and ambition of this community society is remarkable and during the midterm break they install a stage and set with all the technical rig of a large theatre. After a hectic week of shows they return it to be the Hall in a Community College. Evita is a modern sung-through opera (no spoken dialogue) that explores the impact of Eva Duarte Peron, a celebrity and movie star in 1940’s cinema in Argentina.
