'Evita' to repeat-a

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http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/theater/evita_to_repeat_B6mC9LrNA5nkF4oJqpefPP

Cue the balcony -- here comes Eva Peron!

Deals were being finalized this week on a Broadway revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's enduringly popular musical "Evita."

The production will open next year at a Nederlander theater. Nobody will say which one, but the gossip is that "Evita" will follow "West Side Story" into the Palace -- unless Arthur Laurents bars the door.

Elena Roger, who comes from Buenos Aires, will play the title role in this revival, first produced in London in 2006.

British critics raved about Roger, with the Daily Mail proclaiming "Senorita Roger is big, big news. She's going to make this fine musical, oddly overlooked in recent years, a great hooter of a hit all over again."

(British theater criticism has clearly come down a few pegs since Ken Tynan.)

Roger was recommended for the role by a friend who works in Lloyd Webber's production office, The Really Useful Group.

The friend gave Lloyd Webber and Rice a DVD of Roger performing her club act in Buenos Aires.

"She looked great, so we flew her over," Rice told me right after "Evita" opened in London.

"She had to go through quite an ordeal of auditions, but in the end she was the best. And her wonderful Argentinean accent was certainly a plus."

The only trouble is that she's unknown in America, so the producers are looking for a star to play Che Guevara.

They've made an offer to Ricky Martin, but he hasn't accepted yet, sources say.

"Elena Roger is wonderful but, let's be honest, she's not going to sell a ticket," says a production source. "You have to have a star to build an advance today, even for 'Evita.' "

The revival, budgeted at $10 million, will be directed by Michael Grandage and choreographed by Rob Ashford. The producers are Hal Luftig ("Legally Blonde") and Scott Sanders ("The Color Purple").

Grandage, who runs London's Donmar Warehouse, has become a regular hit factory.

His production of "Hamlet," starring Jude Law, made a couple of million dollars last year on Broadway. He also staged the brilliant "Frost/Nixon," starring Frank Langella and Michael Sheen.

And his production of "Red," a new play about expressionist painter Mark Rothko (played by Alfred Molina), opens in April at the Golden Theatre.

"Evita" has never been revived on Broadway. The original production, which starred Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin, opened in 1979 at the Broadway Theatre and ran 3½ years.

"I'm prejudiced, of course, but I do think it's Andrew's best score," Rice once said of a list of songs that includes "Buenos Aires," "Another Suitcase in Another Hall" and the classic anthem "Don't Cry for Me Argentina."

Note to readers: Mr. La Vida Loca isn't a done deal, so e-mail me your "dream Che," and I'll pass along your suggestions to Lloyd Webber when I see him next month in London at the opening of "Love Never Dies," his sequel to "The Phantom of the Opera."