DIVA TALK: Catching Up with Elaine Paige Plus News of LuPone and Lemper
By Andrew Gans
Elaine Paige
News, views and reviews about the multi-talented women of the musical theatre and the concert/cabaret stage.
ELAINE PAIGE Evita, Cats and Chess and made her Broadway debut in Sunset Boulevard is currently celebrating 40 years in show business. The multitalented singing actress, who I've had the abundant pleasure of watching in the West End productions of Piaf, The King and I and Sunset Boulevard as well as in the New York stagings of Sunset and Sweeney Todd , is marking the occasion with a wonderful book of theatrical recollections and photos ("Memories: Celebrating 40 Years in the Theatre") and a thrilling, brand-new CD ("Elaine Paige Live: Celebrating a Life on the Stage"), which arrives on iTunes Sept. 21. The latter is a live recording of her newest, critically acclaimed concert act, which she has performed all over the world and features the actress re-creating (sometimes in costume) several of her most famous roles. Paige hopes to bring the theatre-based concert to New York Hey, Mr. Producer, are you listening? and recently spoke with me about the book, the new CD and her part in the Susan Boyle mania that gripped the world this past summer. That interview with my favorite Brit, one whose talent constantly impresses me, follows:
Question: What brings you to the States this summer? Elaine Paige: Well, I've come to the U.S. Open. I'm becoming a bit of a tennis fan and keep following it around wherever it is! I've been out to Key Biscayne this year to see the tennis there and Wimbledon. I thought, "You know what, I'm not working this summer. I'm going to go and see the U.S. Open as well!"
Question: Anyone you're particularly rooting for at the Open? Paige: Well, my man is [Roger] Federer. I just think he is absolutely the king. He's just the best, so graceful, and I enjoy watching because he's so beautiful to watch.
Question: Do you play yourself? Paige: I do indeed. I play tennis at Queen's Club in London, which is quite a famous tennis club in the city.
Advertisement
Question: Your autobiography is now available.
Paige: It's not really an autobiography it's me celebrating 40 years onstage. It's really about my life in the theatre over the last 40 years. It's a picture-driven book, really, and then I have several thousand words as well just to fill in the gaps and talk about the people I've worked with and my life in the theatre the different theatres I've worked at, the different characters I've played and all of the people I've met, and some interesting anecdotes from those that I've worked with in that 40 years.
Question: What was it like going back to the early parts of your career?
Paige: It was interesting. The funny thing [was] after I finished the book and I saw it all printed up, I thought, "Wow, did I really do all that?" [Laughs.] It read quite well, and I had forgotten so many things. That was the interesting thing about writing the book. One had to sit down and try and remember the various stories and anecdotes that had happened along the way. And then, of course, the decision was what to put in and what to leave out. So it took a good seven or eight months to write the thing and compile it all and get the photos. It was a really big job. I thought to myself after having finished it, "I should have just written an autobiography. It would have been easier!" [Laughs.]
Question: Had you kept any sort of diary over the years? Paige: Not really. Bits and bobs. Since Evita I suppose, I had kept a yearbook. My parents always kept cuttings and things like that for me. I did have quite a lot of reference material to work out and to look at and dig out of my storage unit. That was another thing there was just piles and piles of this stuff, the photographs and the cuttings and first-night party cards . . . all manner of all this stuff and clutter that I'd kept over the years. So that was rather fun. That's why it took so long, I think. You know what it's like when you start looking at old photos? You sit there and remember your life and reminisce, and that's kind of what I did in a way. But it was useful because if I should ever write an autobiography, a lot of the pre-work, you could say, I've already sort of done.
Question: Was there anything you learned about yourself while doing this that surprised you? Paige: Well, I remembered how much of a worrier I used to be. I'm not so much anymore. I also think I can see that I am a terrible perfectionist in every respect. I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing really. It was just fun to reflect and look back at one's life and all the wonderful people that I've worked with and how supportive my family has been with me over the years. They figured a great deal in a lot of the photographs. It became very apparent to me that my parents, in particular, and my family in general have always been there to support me at all the various opening nights.
Question: That must have been nice to realize that. Paige: It was a wonderful realization, how tight the family is and was for me and how important they were to me. It was just a wonderful reflection on so much that had happened pretty much unplanned.
Question: What do you think you're proudest of about your career? Paige: Well, that I've lasted this long, I think. I think I'm proud that I was able to be part of that sort of renaissance of the British musical with Andrew [Lloyd Webber] and Tim [Rice]. That was sheer luck, I suppose, that I was there at that time when they were coming to the fore and I was able to sort of take that journey along with them to some degree. But I think I'm most proud that I was able to forge a career at all in such a difficult business and to be able to, 40 years on, look at it and think to myself that I'm still up there and still doing it. That is something that I'm very proud of. I think to make it in our business is difficult enough, but to stay there is really [hard as well]. Tim actually said this about me in my 40th anniversary brochure: I'm repeating his comment, really, that to remain in the public's affection and for them to still want to come and see your work, that's what I'm most proud of. I've retained fans who still bother to buy a ticket. [Laughs.]
Question: Do you think you'll return to musical theatre? Would you do another show? Paige: I don't know. The more time goes on, the less and less I think I'm likely to. That's the other thing I think I really noticed when looking back, you do have to devote yourself to it entirely. There's no life outside of it, really, because it's so demanding. I think the older one gets, if I'm truly honest . . . the harder it gets. Musical theatre is unlike any other genre in that it truly is demanding physically. It's easier to do a play. You can do that for three months, and that's doable. But to sign up for a year or more [in a musical], eight shows a week in some rather demanding singing role
And, it's not just the singing, it's everything else that goes with it that makes it so physically and mentally demanding. That's the thing that I would have to contemplate. But, you know, never say never! If the right thing came along
A couple of years ago I did The Drowsy Chaperone in London. Doing that I thought, "Crikey, I've forgotten how demanding it is to do." That wasn't a huge role, but it seemed to take up a lot of my energy.
Question: I think that was the last time we spoke. You had just opened in Drowsy . You also have a new CD, which is being released on iTunes. Where was that recorded? Paige: It was recorded in Ireland, in Dublin, on my U.K. tour. We'd done it a few times over in Scandinavia and China and various other places, and now we were doing the U.K. and Ireland, and I said to the guys, "What about if we record it live?" My [musical director also] said, "You should record it." And so we got it organized, and we did it in Dublin at the Vicar Street Theatre. I thought the roof was going to come off the joint. It was fantastic that we had chosen Ireland, really, because they were the most responsive and wonderful audience to have had. I'm really pleased with it. I've never done a live album before, so that's a first. It's sort of a complement to the book in a way, and there are some anecdotes in the book that I do live onstage. It was great to hear it as a whole piece, as an entity. Obviously, when I'm doing it [onstage, I] just start at the beginning, get to the middle and get to the end. But for me to hear it back as a whole piece, it really does, I think, work well as a story. There's a real kind of story to it, and it's funny and it's moving. I re-create some of the characters onstage with the costumes. It really is a one-woman show more than a concert. Of course, there are all the songs that I'm well-known for, but also there's quite a bit of new material that sort of links how I came to be doing what I'm doing how I got from A to B, the songs that got me there and the anecdotes that tell that story.
Question: Any chance you might do it in the States?
Paige: I'm trying to get it organized. I'm in conversations with various people about that at the moment, or my management are, so I'm waiting to see whether I can do it. I really would like to be able to bring it here, but it seems very difficult. . . . I think it would be something that would go down well here because it encapsulates my entire career. It's interesting in that I'm doing things in it that people here wouldn't have seen me do, like Piaf. There's a whole vignette about Piaf. I take a piece out of the play and enact it. I don a wig and so on. I do all of this rather quickly in front of an audience.
Question: I like that kind of theatricality in a concert. Paige: It's because you're doing it in front of their eyes, and they see you change from being Elaine into the character. It's interesting.
Question: You've also been hosting a weekly radio show for quite awhile. Paige: Yes, it's five years this coming weekend, this Sunday. It's my fifth anniversary, and I have the Jersey Boys come onto the show and sing "Happy Birthday" to me. [Laughs.] It's a good show, and I'm loving it. I just can't believe that it is five years. You see, this is what happens. [Laughs.] Life happens to you, and you're having a great time, and suddenly you turn around and five years have gone by. The listening figures are going up, and it's become a loved show in England and all over the world actually. I get a lot of e-mails particularly from this country and Australia. I'm really pleased with the way it's been.
Question: You were also a big part of the whole Susan Boyle mania this past summer. Paige: Isn't that amazing? That came out of nowhere. I was actually on holiday when that first hit, when she was kind enough to mention my name [on "Britain's Got Talent"]. I was completely unaware of it. And then I got back from a break that I was taking after my concert tour, and I was inundated with e-mail from friends all over the world. Alan Campbell, who I played opposite in Sunset , e-mailed me, and Tim Rice e-mailed
people from everywhere saying, "You've got to see this!" I thought, "What are they going on about?" So, that's how I discovered it. It was on my e-mail, the YouTube thing. She had sung "I Dreamed a Dream," which indeed I sing in my show. So I have now met her, of course. I don't know if that came out here.
Question: Yes, I saw it on "The Today Show." Paige: Right. [Meredith Vieira] flew over and interviewed Susan, and then I surprised her [in the studio].
Question: What was that like? Paige: I thought, "My gosh, I hope this goes down okay. Maybe she won't be pleased to see me." [Laughs.] But she was suitably surprised, I think.
Question: She seemed shocked. Paige: She seemed pretty shocked. So it was nice. They cut an awful lot of it out, but I sat and chatted with her for a bit and then, of course, I saw her after the broadcast had been done, and we chatted for a while. She was just a sweet person, and I wished her well. So that is extraordinary.
Question: Did you give her advice? Paige: Somebody said to her, "Have you got anything you want to ask Elaine?" She asked me what songs I like to sing best, so I told her I'm a ballad person myself. I like to sing ballads because you can immerse yourself into the character and get involved in the lyric and that kind of thing. And then she said, "Can I ask you, how do you get to sleep at night after a performance?" [Laughs.] I think she's having trouble with that, having to come down from a performance. And I said to her, "Well, with great difficulty." [Laughs.] "You have to do a lot of deep breathing and meditation and that kind of thing, and drink hot milk." [Laughs.] She was very nice. It just reminded me of how my life turned around with Evita . . . but, for me, I was a professional person and had years of experience prior to it. Even with all of that, it hit me like a ton of bricks the fact that everybody wants a piece of you, and you suddenly haven't got any free time for yourself and you're everywhere all the time. I felt for her because I could see that it must be a terrible well it is, I know, I've been there terrible shock. As glamorous and as wonderful as it all seems, it is a shock and something that takes a bit of time to adjust to. But, of course, I didn't have YouTube and instant worldwide attention. Mine happened first in England and then the States, so it was a slower process. For her it was just instant overnight, and [there is great] pressure involved in that. So we talked about that a bit, and I tried to give her some advice and to tell her to make sure she took time out for herself to have some quiet-down time on her own and not to just say yes to absolutely everything.
Question: There was talk that maybe you two might record something together. Paige: Well, they're still talking about it. I don't know. I know she is, at the moment, making an album. Simon Cowell is involved in overseeing that. I think she's making it for Sony Music. I haven't had the call yet. [Laughs.] So we'll see. But I know she's keen to do something together, so I said, "Well, let's see how it goes. If your people want to ring my people, I'd be delighted!" But as I speak to you at the moment, I haven't heard. It would be fun. Continued...
