SHOCKED? I THOUGHT A BOMB WENT OFF!
Glamorous granny steals nation’s heart on Ireland’s Got Talent with a barnstorming rendition of the Stephen Sondheim classic
WIDOW Evelyn Williams went from Fair City extra to household name last night with a show-stopping performance on Ireland’s Got Talent. The 81year-old stunned judges Louis Walsh, Michelle Visage, Denise van Outen and Jason Byrne with a barnstorming version of the Stephen Sondheim hit, Send in the Clowns.
And Michelle was so moved by the performance that she pressed her golden buzzer, setting off an explosion of tickertape, and catapulting Evelyn straight through to the live semi-finals. However, the great grandmother revealed that the look of shock across her face during last night’s premiere was due to the loud explosion which she thought was a bomb going off in the theatre.
‘Louis was very nice to me. When the golden buzzer went off I got such a shock. I didn’t know what was going on. I was crying and very upset because when I heard the bang, I thought someone was after throwing a bomb into the arena. I never witnessed anything like that before. I was standing on stage and in my head anything that could go wrong was going wrong because I thought I could have sang the song better.
‘There was this big bang and I thought they were after coming in with the bombs and I was crying away and frozen on the spot. Then Louis stands up and asks me where have I been? I said I’ve been around, and I was an also-ran. Even the cameraman said to me that I will never be an also-ran again. So it was really emotional and I still can’t believe it has happened.’
Evelyn lives in Tallaght where she works as a professional extra and has been singing all her life. Her house is littered with the spoils of a lifetime performing. There are trophies and certificates, commendations and even a letter from former President Mary Robinson as well as a tribute to James Dean; Evelyn’s guilty pleasure.
She may not be the tallest of individuals, but she possesses a gigantic personality. Her laugh is infectious and her warmth captivating, as is her vulnerability, which stole the show last night.
Evelyn’s love of music and singing came from her Dad. He always thought she was special. He passed away when she was just 16.
‘My dad was nine years bedridden before God took him,’ she says. ‘He had leaking valves in his heart and they were so prehistoric – the doctors at that time – that they used to say to my mother to send one of us around to the chip shop to get a bowl of ice. He would suck on the ice and it was supposed to help his heart. He was a great man.
‘When he passed away my mother got a job in Leinster House, scrubbing and cleaning. It was a tough time but we just got on with it. We didn’t have much but we didn’t want for anything.’
Evelyn kept singing because it was her passion, but also because it was what her father would have wanted. Back when she was starting out, she earned a reputation as a rising star, singing for good causes, which landed her in interesting situations. She also caught the eye of the prison services and was hired to pep up the inmates in Dublin’s most notorious jail. ‘I think I sang in every charity show in the 70s. I would sing wherever would have me. I love doing it. I would sing in hospitals and I even went up to Mountjoy and sang for the prisoners. But when we were there, we had to tie paper, newspaper, all around our legs so they wouldn’t see our legs and get frustrated.’
Evelyn sits back in her leather armchair and picks up a white wedding album. It is from 1960 when she married the great love of her life, Noel, who passed away seven years ago. In many ways the living room is a shrine to the great love they shared together. The sepia photographs show a beautiful couple brimming with happiness.
He always encouraged her passion for music even though ‘he was tone deaf’, she says. They started their married life together in Drimnagh, in a one-bedroomed tenement flat. They had no running water and the toilets were two floors away.
Ten years later they moved to a council house in Tallaght, but that kick-started 25 years of misery. Over the years the house sank as it was built on a well, and started to subside. The front room we are in now is warm and bright, but a far cry from the ‘hovel’ that it had become over the years.
‘Noel never liked the house and everything that could have gone wrong with it did,’ she says. ‘I foolishly finished the payment on the house in Tallaght because once I did, the council didn’t want to know us. The subsidence was so bad you were running downhill in my bedroom. It went on years.
‘Noel was never sick a day in his life. I have asthma and diabetes and an underactive thyroid. But he was never sick a day and then he developed the worst form of emphysema. Noel had nothing wrong with him. He had a chest cold and it went astray and he only had a year and a half with illness.
‘He died and after a couple of weeks I contacted Allianz and I gave them €600 a year for insurance and, to be fair to them, they came through. After all the years with dampness and windows falling
‘When the buzzer went off I got such a shock’ ‘We tied newspaper around our legs’
out, buying new doors, they told me that they were going to get everything done. And they did. They put me up in a penthouse in a hotel and two builders rebuilt my house.
‘The house means nothing to me because Noel is not there to share it with me, but it means comfort. I miss him terribly to this day and it is very lonely without him. Losing him was such a shock for me. He was so good to me, so loving and I miss him so much. He was 77 and we started going out when we were 16 years old.’
She has six grandchildren and six great grandchildren who are all over the world. Her daughter Eileen is her best friend and, although she has been living in the Middle East, the news that she is moving back to Spain has given her a real lift.
Evelyn is a bundle of energy and insists that age is only a number. ‘I don’t feel nearly 82,’ she laughs. ‘I don’t feel 22. It does get lonely without Noel but the children make you feel young and alive.’
Her granddaughter, Evelyn, auditioned for X Factor and is responsible for entering this glamorous granny into Ireland’s Got Talent.
‘I nearly died that night because I don’t think I deserved it. I was second last in a big line of people that day and that was from early in the morning until 11pm that day. My granddaughter sent in the video to the producers.
‘It was a big surprise for me to take part so I still can’t believe what happened. The next show, I am talking with the producers about what I will be singing but I don’t know yet. I have sent in three songs to them so we will see. It would be wonderful and out of this world if I won. But I wouldn’t flatter myself to think that it was going to be me. I still can’t believe that I am here talking to you.’
Evelyn, a lifelong Labour Party member, opened her doors for a nonpolitical party last night when she had friends and family call around to watch the show live. She even borrowed her neighbours’ big screen TV.
‘I had a very happy life singing. I don’t know how this run will end up, but it is such a warm and nice surprise I will just run with it. But I still can’t believe it is happening to me.
‘Michelle Visage is such a lovely lady and I don’t know why she picked me but she did. I will do my best now in the semi-finals. I will have a Christening around then so, hopefully, all my family will be there to see it. I just want to enjoy myself and not let anybody down’.
‘It does get lonely without my Noel’