Tina Arena has been performing since she was a six year old and has seen it all – Harvey Weinstein, loss, love and superstardom in Europe. And now back in Australia with her partner and son, she’s finally ready to take on the most challenging and thrilling role of her career, she tells Juliet Rieden.
She’s the tiny Italian-Australian with the vocal cords of an orchestra and a fiery Latinate passion, so it feels entirely appropriate that Tina Arena would be cast as Eva Peron. Eva, the Argentinian pauper-turned-actress-turned-FirstLady whose emotional speeches championing women’s suffrage had some of her people in raptures and showgirl pizazz had others baying for her blood, seems made for Tina.
Evita is probably Andrew Lloyd Webber’s most powerful and demanding musical. The melodies lift and soar with a vocal range few can master. Madonna famously tried in the 1996 film version but her voice wasn’t up to it. Tina Arena, however, is a different proposition. “Andrew is punishing as a writer, absolutely, for a vocalist, without doubt, and I say that with the greatest of compliment. These songs are gruelling,” she explains.
Over the years Tina says she’s been approached often. “I don’t think I was ready in my 30s to play Eva Peron at all. I just didn’t feel ready emotionally,” she says. “Playing the role of Eva Peron now, at 50, is much more suited to the life experience that I’ve had.”
Tina is back in Melbourne and when we meet she’s surrounded by what she claims to be organised chaos at the tail end of renovations on the newly purchased house she and her partner, French artist Vincent Mancini, and their 12-year-old son Gabriel are settling into. It looks pretty sorted to me, but Tina’s neatness standards, I suspect, are more exacting.
The family has been dividing its time between France and Australia, “going backwards and forwards for about five or six years. Gabriel was born in Paris but schooled between France and Melbourne, up until grade five. Grade six, which was last year, he stayed in school the entire year here in Melbourne.”
Denne historien er fra July 2018-utgaven av The Australian Women's Weekly.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra July 2018-utgaven av The Australian Women's Weekly.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Hitting a nerve
Regulating the vagus nerve with its links to depression, anxiety, arthritis and diabetes - could aid physical and mental wellbeing.
Take me to the river
With a slew of new schedules and excursions to explore, the latest river cruises promise to give you experiences and sights you won’t see on the ocean.
The last act
When family patriarch Tom Edwards passes away, his children must come together to build his coffin in four days, otherwise they will lose their inheritance. Can they put their sibling rivalry aside?
MEET RUSSIA'S BRAVEST WOMEN
When Alexei Navalny died in a brutal Arctic prison, Vladimir Putin thought he had triumphed over his most formidable opponent. Until three courageous women - Alexei's mother, wife and daughter - took up his fight for freedom.
The wines and lines mums
Once only associated with glamorous A-listers, cocaine is now prevalent with the soccer-mum set - as likely to be imbibed at a school fundraiser as a nightclub. The Weekly looks inside this illegal, addictive, rising trend.
Jenny Liddle-Bob.Lucy McDonald.Sasha Green - Why don't you know their names?
Indigenous women are being murdered at frightening rates, their deaths often left uninvestigated and widely unreported. Here The Weekly meets families who are battling grief and desperate for solutions.
Growing happiness
Through drought flood and heartbreak, Jenny Jennr's sunflowers bloom with hope, sunshine and joy
"Thank God we make each other laugh"
A shared sense of humour has seen Aussie comedy couple Harriet Dyer and Patrick Brammall conquer the world. But what does life look like when the cameras go down:
Winter baking with apples and pears
Celebrate the season of Australian apples and pears with these sweet bakes that will keep the midwinter blues away.
Budget dinner winners
Looking for some thrifty inspiration for weeknight dinners? Try our tasty line-up of low-cost recipes that are bound to please everyone at the table.
