Making Evita

In early February 1996, following the ordeal of the stalking trial, Madonna left Los Angeles for Buenos Aires. After recording the soundtrack to Evita, she may have thought the worst was behind her. However, Madonna was still in for a bumpy ride. When she arrived in Buenos Aires a few days before she was scheduled to begin filming, she realized that life wasn’t going to be easy for her in “this godforsaken place” (as she referred to the city). Plastered all over the city was graffiti screaming, “Madonna go home.” It was apparent that some Argentinians were unhappy with the notion that a brazen pop star would be portraying their beloved Evita.

To make matters worse, living conditions were, at first, a lot more challenging than those to which Madonna had become accustomed during the last twelve years of being a superstar. “No gyms! No decent food!” she groused. “I can’t live like this,” she shouted at one of the film’s production assistants. “I need Evian. Do you hear me? Ev-i-an!’

Soon, though, Madonna was ensconced — at least on weekends — in a lavish $12-million mansion, renting it for $70,000 a week. Of course, as would be the nature of any diva, she made a couple of demands deemed outrageous by some observers — such as floating gardenias in the bathroom bowls, and white orchids in all of the other rooms — as well as some other less unreasonable requests: a blender, apple and mango juices, popcorn, Gummi Bears, Special K cereal, oatmeal, potato chips, assorted fresh vegetables, teriyaki chicken, and a CD player in every room. She also asked that one room be transformed into a gym equipped with a treadmill, Lifecycle, StairMaster, Versa Climber and free weights. Of course, there was always shopping to keep her busy, as well. On one Sunday, she went on a shopping spree at the sprawling San Elmo flea market, where she stayed for three hours. Then, it was off to Antigona, a vintage clothing store where she bought fifty hats, ten pairs of gloves, a dozen dresses and ten lace mantillas. Bodyguards, chauffeurs and assistants waited to open doors for her, write out checks for her, or compliment her on her good taste.

Despite her comfortable lifestyle, there was still the nagging problem with which Madonna was so well acquainted: the burden of fame itself. Those fans who had migrated to this strange land “tormented” (her word) and “stalked” (again, her word) her when she wasn’t at her weekend home but at her hotel, closer to the set, turning it into a virtual prison. A group of young, determined admirers kept a steady vigil outside the window of their idol’s second floor suite, chanting and serenading the object of their obsession. “I slept like shit,” Madonna complained. “The children outside my window came at two-hour intervals all through the night to beckon me to my balcony and profess undying love . . . Shakespeare this was not.”

Leaving the hotel proved even more difficult. Each time Madonna exited, the crowds rushed her. “Unfortunately five hundred screaming fans made my departure almost impossible,” she said later, describing the scene. Once, while attempting a quick getaway one afternoon, she and her entourage sped away in a car only to discover that a young girl was holding on for dear life to the roof of the vehicle. “So we stopped and pulled her off as she kicked and screamed and cried that she loved me,” Madonna said. “I wanted to give her the business card of my shrink but my driver drove away too fast.”

The stress, however, didn’t dissuade Madonna from sticking to a strict agenda in order to continue to better herself during production. Since she would be called upon not only to sing, but to dance and, of course, act, she worked diligently to be at peak form in all three areas.

As for her acting, in order to become absorbed by the complicated character of Evita, Madonna traveled about Argentina meeting people who had known the real Eva Perón — diplomats, intellectuals, ministers and even a few of her childhood friends. “Of course, some refuse to meet me,” Madonna said at the time. However, to those who would agree to talk to her, Madonna asked dozens of well-thought-out questions about the way Evita looked, the food she ate, the manner in which she behaved and what she enjoyed doing in her spare time. So grateful for the information she was receiving, she would kiss some of her interviewees on the nose, others gently on the lips. “It was fun to be the interviewer for a change,” she laughed. As a result of this kind of research, Madonna began to understand subtle character traits she sensed would be necessary to guarantee her best performance of Eva Perón.

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Filming of Evita began on February 13, 1996. In the first days of production Madonna became aware of the reality of how excruciating it was going to be to put all of her hard-earned, newfound acting, singing and dancing skills to the test on the Evita set. It was swelteringly hot in Buenos Aires in February and Madonna, as the fifteen-year-old Eva in her period costume and uncomfortable wig, on the first day of shooting was required to do take after take while saying good-bye to her family on the way to the big city. An ancient train billowed out a steady stream of noxious smoke and hot winds blew dust into her mouth as she lipsynched to her prerecorded song. It was a miserable experience, and only a foreshadowing of things to come.

In the days that followed, Madonna was required to spend long days in the intense sun alternating between waiting around for the proper light to film and performing in complicated song-and-dance numbers. “I was dying from heat exhaustion and being made a meal of by ants and flies and hornets,” she said later.

Madonna was shooting six days a week and rehearsing on her day off. As filming dragged on in Buenos Aires she began feeling more and more lonely and alienated. “My family and friends are the people in the movie,” she said at the time. “They have seen me bare my soul and yet they know nothing about me.” She was also feeling dizzy and nauseous every day, conditions she blamed on the incredible heat.

Her moodiness aside, Madonna continued to prove herself the consummate professional while actually doing her job in front of the cameras. Cast and crew members, some grudgingly, couldn’t help but admire her total commitment to the project. Even Jonathan Pryce — who played Evita’s husband Juan Perón and who said after the first few days of working with her that he had never worked with anyone quite as rude — eventually found good things to say about her. “She’s a strong, dynamic force and I can only admire that,” he admitted. “I’ve grown to like her a lot. People have preconceptions about her due to the media but you soon learn she’s a regular person. True, she doesn’t discourage the media too much, but there’s a lot of myth created around her.”

Adding to Madonna’s turmoil was the fact that Antonio Banderas’s girlfriend, the actress Melanie Griffith, had become an annoyance. As soon as Banderas was cast as the movie’s narrator, Ché, Madonna began hearing from certain associates of hers that Melanie Griffith was unhappy. Because Madonna is widely viewed as a “man killer,” Melanie was concerned that her boyfriend would fall prey to her, especially since Madonna had made it clear in her Truth or Dare film that she fancied Banderas and thought he was “very sexy.” (She also hastened to add, “He must have a really small penis because no one is that perfect.”)

“What I don’t need right now is a jealous girlfriend,” Madonna told Alan Parker, according to one of Parker’s associates. “I’m not even interested in Antonio. That crack in Truth or Dare was just a stupid joke. Antonio is too strait-laced for me.” She was clearly upset. Alan Parker rested his forehead against Madonna’s in an attempt to comfort her. Then, he kissed her on the nose and walked away. She stood in place, probably feeling that she had just been treated in a condescending manner.

Later, when Madonna was told that Melanie would be accompanying her boyfriend to Argentina, she couldn’t believe it. “How could a woman be that insecure?” she asked. “If it were me, and he was my boyfriend, and I was worried about another woman — I’d say, ‘Hey, go get her, tiger . . . and then get the fuck out.’ And that would be the end of it.”

Shortly before filming began, Madonna took matters into her own hands and decided to call Melanie Griffith.

“I understand that there have been some rumors,” she reportedly told her, “and I just want you to know that they’re completely ridiculous. I actually can’t wait for you to get here, Melanie. We’ll have fun!” Melanie’s reaction to the call is unknown. After she hung up, though, Madonna turned to an associate and said, “Well, that should take care of that. And if it doesn’t, I guess I’ll just have to deal with her when she gets to Argentina with her henpecked boyfriend.”

Despite having received the conciliatory telephone call from Madonna, Melanie was still distant toward her when she finally did arrive on the set. “It seemed as if she didn’t trust her,” said Louise Keith, a Los Angeles – based friend of Griffith’s. “Madonna was certainly flirty toward Antonio, but I think it was harmless and just the way Madonna is. However, Melanie didn’t like it. She told me that Madonna did everything she could do to win her over, but Melanie wasn’t giving in to her. ‘I don’t want to socialize with her, not really,’ Melanie said when asked by one of Madonna’s ‘handlers’ if she might like to join Madonna for lunch. Well, that really pissed off Madonna. Actually, I don’t think they said two words to each other the whole time Melanie was there, a couple of weeks. Instead, they just shot each other frosty glares whenever they were in each other’s company.”

A crew member later recalled, “Madonna couldn’t contain herself and she blurted out, ‘Melanie hates me.’ She told Parker, ‘She won’t accept an invitation if I’m in the same room. I don’t know what Banderas sees in her but she’s got him by the balls.’”

For publication, Madonna made light of the Melanie Griffith situation. In writing about the incident in Vanity Fair, Madonna refused even to mention Melanie’s name: “The press is trying to make a big deal about my competing with his [Banderas’s] girlfriend,” she wrote, “which is ludicrous because everyone knows I would never date a man who wears cowboy boots.”

For her part, Melanie remained diplomatic with the media. In fact, Griffith told the author that she was instrumental in smoothing the working relationship between her husband and Madonna. “They say she can be difficult, but I understand her,” says Melanie Griffith. “In fact, I think I understand her better than Antonio, being a woman in this business. I know that she wants things perfect but that some men don’t want to listen to her opinion precisely because she is a woman. Do you know how frustrating that is? I told Antonio to listen to her instincts. She has very good instincts. He did.

“Of course they never had an affair,” Melanie said. “Would I tolerate such a thing? No, I would not.”

Madonna’s enthusiasm for the Evita project reemerged when the production moved to the location of her dreams — the balcony of the Casa Rosada, which was the shooting location for which she had pleaded with the president of Argentina, Carlos Menem, for permission to shoot. To make the scene as visually dynamic as possible, the company used every extra available, a total of 4,000. When Madonna walked onto the balcony, she couldn’t help but gasp in awe of her surroundings. Looking down from the balcony, as far as the eye could see were . . . people. True, they were hired hands, but they must have seemed like fans just the same. When she began to mouth the words to the prerecorded “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” this audience erupted into unbridled cheers.

After the all-night shoot, Madonna was so exhilarated by her work she could barely speak. As the sun rose, the cast and crew quietly hugged each other. In spite of the difficulties they had been experiencing, on this morning they seemed to feel a keen sense of triumph. The filming of the many difficult Buenos Aires segments of the movie was finally coming to a close and now, after the emotional night of shooting at the Casa Rosada, everyone felt as if they were actually accomplishing what they had set out to do. Maybe things would work out after all. Maybe they really were working together to create something extremely special. After having sunk to such a desperate low only a few days earlier, everyone’s morale was now suddenly elevated to a new high.

However, Evita was far from complete. After a few days of rest, the entire company would move to Hungary for many more weeks of grueling work. Once there, a new problem would arise, and it would be one that no one could have anticipated . . . and which, at least for the moment, only the leading lady suspected: Madonna was pregnant.