ABSTRACT
This study explores the phenomenon of the libidinal attraction of the public figure of the actress Eva Perón-the extremely famous wife of Argentine president Juan Perón (1945-52)—and the following of her seduced audiences, under the light of current theories of gender construction and performance. I claim that in the fictional roles of her performing career Evita rehearsed the model of the political activist she would become during the Peronist administration, in which she starred as the protagonist of a flamboyant public theatricality. Her training as an actress resulted in a melodramatic style that could be traced from her first steps performing second-rate roles in the commercial theater and films, followed by the radio soaps she read passionately in the early 1940s, to conclude finally in her declamatory gestures at political gatherings.
