Elaine Paige OBE (
née
Bickerstaff; born 5 March 1948) is an English
singer and actress best known for her work in
musical theatre.
Raised in Barnet
, North London
, Paige attended the Aida Foster stage school and
made her first professional appearance on stage in 1964.
Her
appearance in the 1968 production of Hair marked her West
End
debut.
Following a number of roles over the next decade, Paige was
selected to play
Eva Perón in the
first production of
Evita
in 1978, which brought her to the attention of the broader public.
For this role, she won the
Laurence Olivier Award for
Performance of the Year in a Musical. She went on to originate the
role of
Grizabella in
Cats and had a Top 10 hit with
"
Memory", a song from the show. In
1985, Paige released "
I Know Him So
Well" with
Barbara Dickson from
the musical
Chess, which
remains the biggest-selling record by a female duo. She then
appeared in the original stage production of
Chess,
followed by a starring role in
Anything Goes which she also co-produced.
Paige made
her Broadway
debut in
Sunset Boulevard
in 1996, playing the lead role of Norma
Desmond, to critical acclaim. She appeared in
The King and I from 2000 to
2001, and six years later she returned to the West End stage in
The Drowsy Chaperone.
She has also worked in film and television.
In addition to being nominated for five
Laurence Olivier Awards, Paige has
won many other awards for her theatre roles and has been called the
First Lady of British Musical Theatre. She has released 20 solo
albums, of which eight were consecutively certified
gold and another four
multi-platinum. Paige is also featured on seven cast albums and has
sung in concerts across the world. Since 2004 she has hosted her
own show on
BBC Radio 2
called
Elaine Paige on
Sunday.
Background
Paige was
raised in Barnet, North London, where her father worked as an estate agent and her
mother was a milliner. Her mother
had been a singer in her youth, and her father was an amateur
drummer. Paige stands at just under 5 feet (1.5 m) tall,
which she says has caused her to lose out on leading roles. Her
original ambition was to become a professional tennis player, at
which point her headmistress pointed out to her "they'd never see
you over the net", but Paige continued to play tennis and has
referred to the sport as one of her passions.
At 14, Paige listened to the film soundtrack of
West Side Story, which evoked
the desire for a career in musical theatre. Paige's musical ability
was encouraged by her school music teacher, Ann Hill. Paige's first
role on stage was playing Susanna in a school production of
Mozart's
The Marriage of Figaro, which
was followed by parts in
The Boy Mozart and solos in
Handel's
Messiah— "a difficult work for little
children". Her father suggested that she should go to drama school,
so she attended the Aida Foster stage school. After graduating, her
first job was modeling children's clothing at the
Ideal Home Exhibition.
Career
Early career – 1968-1980: West End debut and
Evita
Paige's first professional appearance on stage was during the UK
tour of the
Anthony Newley/
Leslie Bricusse musical
The
Roar of the Greasepaint—the Smell of the Crowd in 1964,
playing the role of a
Chinese urchin.
At the age
of 20, she made her West End
debut in Hair on 27 September 1968, remaining in
the cast until March 1970. While also being an understudy
for the character of Sheila, she played a member of the tribe in
the chorus, for which role she was required to be naked on stage in
one scene. and over the next decade, she played roles in various
musicals, including
Jesus
Christ Superstar;
Nuts;
Grease, in which she played the lead
role of Sandy from 1973 to 1974;
Billy, from 1974 to 1975 playing Rita;
and
The Boyfriend, as Maisie
(1975–1976).
After months of acting and singing auditions,
Hal Prince offered the still relatively unknown
Paige the title role of
Eva Perón in
the first stage production of the
Tim Rice
and
Andrew Lloyd Webber musical
Evita. Her performance won
her critical acclaim and brought her into public prominence at the
age of 30. Paige was actually the second choice for the part after
Julie Covington, but Covington had turned the opportunity down. For
her performance in
Evita, she won the
Laurence Olivier Award for
Performance of the Year in a Musical, the
Society of West End Theatre
Award for Best Actress in a Musical and the
Variety Club Award for Showbusiness Personality
of the Year. She played the role for 20 months in total, from 1978
to 1980. She also released her first studio album in 1978, entitled
Sitting Pretty. Prior to her success in
Evita,
Paige had strongly considered becoming a nursery nurse, but after
she sang for
Dustin Hoffman, he made
her promise that she would continue in theatre work.She was also in
adventures of a plumber's mate.
1981–1993: Cats and Chess era
Paige went on to portray some of Lloyd Webber's most notable female
characters, creating the role of
Grizabella in the original production of
Cats from 11 May 1981 to 13
February 1982. She took on the role late in the rehearsal process
when the actress
Judi Dench had to
withdraw due to a torn
Achilles
tendon. Paige's performance of the song "
Memory" from
Cats, with which she had
a Top 10 hit, is her signature piece. The single reached
number 5 in the
UK charts and
has since been recorded by a further 160 artists. She reprised the
role of Grizabella for the
video release
of
Cats in 1998, one of only two performers in the film
from the original London cast. Paige's website claims that the
video soon became the bestselling music video in the UK and
America.
Paige had a starring role in the 1983 production of
Abbacadabra, written by former
ABBA members,
Björn
Ulvaeus and
Benny Andersson, in
which she played the role of Carabosse. She then originated the
role of Florence for the 1984 concept album of
Chess, with lyrics by
Tim Rice and music by Ulvaeus and Andersson. Her
albums,
Stages
(1983), and
Cinema (1984), rejoined the
cast recording of
Chess in the UK top 40 chart,
giving her three consecutive successful albums. In 1985, Paige
released "
I Know Him So Well", a
duet from
Chess, singing with
Barbara Dickson. The single held the
number 1 position in the British singles charts for four
weeks, and still remains the biggest-selling record by a female
duo, according to the
Guinness Book of Records. From
1986 to 1987, Paige appeared as Florence in the stage production of
Chess, a role that earned her another Laurence Olivier
Award nomination in the category of Outstanding Performance by an
Actress in a Musical.
She next sang at the White House
in 1988.
Paige then took on the part of Reno Sweeney in the musical
production of
Anything Goes,
which she co-produced and starred in from 1989 to 1990.
Patti Lupone was appearing as Sweeney on
Broadway around that time, so Paige sought to become the
co-producer of the West End production as a way to secure the role
there before Lupone could take it. Playing Reno Sweeney was Paige's
first experience using an American accent on stage, and the part
secured her third nomination for an Olivier Award. Beyond her
theatre roles, she appeared in the television programme
Unexplained Laughter in 1989 alongside
Diana Rigg.
In 1993, Paige signed up for a year as French chanteuse
Édith Piaf in
Pam
Gems' musical play,
Piaf,
to critical acclaim.
The
Guardian wrote that Paige was "a magnificent, perfect
Piaf". The demanding production required Paige to sing 15 songs,
some in French, and to be on stage for 2 hours 40 minutes
in total, and forced her to leave early due to exhaustion. Her
portrayal of Piaf earned her nomination for a fourth Olivier Award
for Best Actress in a Musical; she subsequently released an album,
entitled
Piaf, containing Édith Piaf songs.
1994–2001: Sunset Boulevard and Broadway debut
In 1995, Paige was appointed an
Officer of the Order
of the British Empire (OBE) by
Queen Elizabeth for her
contributions to musical theatre.
Paige stepped into the role of
Norma
Desmond in Lloyd Webber's West End production of
Sunset Boulevard in 1994,
when
Betty Buckley was ill, before
taking over the part full time the following year. She then won the
Variety Club Award for Best Actress of the Year, and was nominated
for a best actress Olivier Award in 1996 for her performance in the
musical.
She then transferred to the American
production to make her Broadway debut at the
Minskoff
Theatre
on 12 September 1996, staying with the show until
it closed on 22 March 1997. On the
Sunset Boulevard
set in Broadway, the staircase steps reportedly had to be raised
six inches (15 cm) in order to accommodate Paige's short
stature, or it would have been hard to see her behind the banister.
Paige received largely positive reviews for her New York
performance as Norma Desmond: "The lush sound and the sheer power
of her voice are, to put it simply, incredible", wrote one critic,
whilst another said "Her voice has great range, remarkable clarity
and emotional force". Paige was the first Norma Desmond in
Sunset Boulevard to sing one of the show's key songs,
"With One Look", which she did first at Lloyd Webber's wedding to
Madeleine Gurdon, although at the
time the song was called "Just One Glance". Lloyd Webber noted,
regarding Paige's performance of "As If We Never Said Goodbye",
that it was "as good, if not the best, of anything I've ever
heard". Although she had been disappointed when she hoped to
perform on Broadway in
Evita,
Cats and
Chess, Paige stated of her Broadway debut, "It was just
the most perfect time to go with that particular show". After
Sunset Boulevard finished, she suffered from depression,
commenting that the show's closing "was the most terrible
feeling. ... I'd felt I'd lost something so very important to
me. I thought it had died and gone away".
Arts commentator
Melvyn Bragg hosted a
special edition of
The South
Bank Show about Paige's career in 1996, entitled
The
Faces of Elaine Paige. The episode saw her visiting parts of
the world where plays she had starred in had been set.
In 1997, Paige made
her United States concert debut when she opened the Boston Pops season, which was aired on WGBH
in
America. The following year, she made a guest star
appearance at Andrew Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday celebration at
the Royal Albert
Hall
. During the birthday tribute show, she sang
"Memory" and "
Don't Cry for
Me Argentina", two songs from her past musical productions by
Lloyd Webber. Paige's next role was Célimène in the non-musical
play
Le Misanthrope in 1998,
but she admitted that she missed the musical element and that the
silence was slightly unsettling to her. A Lifetime Achievement
Award from The
National Operatic and
Dramatic Association soon followed. She later performed
alongside
Bette Midler in a 1999 New
York concert to raise money for the
Breast Cancer Research
Foundation.
From 2000
to 2001, she starred as Anna in an acclaimed revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein's
The King and I at the
London
Palladium
. Paige had turned down an offer for the role
the first time she was approached, but later accepted, admitting
that she had "forgotten what a fantastic score it was", although
she did question her own suitability for the role. Before the
opening, the box office had already taken in excess of
£7 million in ticket sales. The critic for
The Independent commented, "It may well
be impossible to be a success as Evita and a success as Anna",
whereas
The Spectator
asserted that the role further strengthened her title as the "First
Lady of British Musical Theatre".
2002–present: Radio and return to West End
Paige
sang at the opening of the 2002
Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City
, Utah
, and then
made her Los Angeles concert debut at the Pasadena
Civic Auditorium
. In 2003, she played Angèle in
Where
There's a Will, directed by
Peter Hall. She next sang the
role of Mrs Lovett in the
New York
City Opera production of
Stephen
Sondheim's
Sweeney
Todd in March 2004, earning positive reviews from critics,
and a nomination for a
Drama Desk
Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical. Paige then embarked
upon a UK tour which was entitled "No Strings Attached".
In September 2004, Paige began a weekly radio show,
Elaine Paige on Sunday, on
BBC Radio 2, featuring
music from musical theatre and film. In an unfavourable review, the
show was described by Elisabeth Mahoney of
The Guardian as "a chilly, alienating
listening experience" and a "rare wrong move" on the part of
Radio 2. Lisa Martland of
The Stage agreed that "it
is by far the music that brings me back to the programme ...
and not her lightweight presenting style". However, the show
regularly attracts 3 million listeners, and interviews are
also featured each week. Paige also focused on television
appearances, playing Dora Bunner in the 2005
ITV
adaptation of
Agatha Christie's
A Murder is Announced
in the
Marple series,
before performing a guest role as a post mistress in
Where the Heart Is.
The episode of
Marple was watched by 7.78 million
viewers, and
Where the Heart Is was seen by
6.34 million.
In 2006, Paige released her first full studio album of new
recordings in 12 years, entitled
Essential Musicals.
The album included popular songs from musicals identified by a poll
on her radio show, in which 400,000 listeners voted. Paige has
recorded 20 solo albums in total, of which eight were consecutively
certified
gold
and another four multi-platinum, and she has been featured on seven
cast albums. More recently, she has collaborated with the duo
Secret Garden in recording the
song "The Things You Are to Me" for their 2007 album,
Inside
I'm Singing.
Paige has also appeared in concert in
Scandinavia, Hong Kong, Europe, the Middle East, New Zealand,
Australia and Singapore
. On 20 and 21 December 2006, she performed
in concert in Shanghai, extending her concert tour to two dates to
satisfy demand. Explaining in 2006 why she had not taken a role in
a musical for many years, she stated that "there's been nothing
that I've wanted to do, and if you're going to commit to a year at
the theatre, six days a week, and have no life, then it's got to be
something that you want to do with all your heart". She also
affirmed that she believes for older actors it becomes harder to
obtain theatre roles.
In 2007,
Paige returned to the West End stage for the first time in six
years, as the Chaperone/Beatrice Stockwell in The Drowsy Chaperone at the
Novello
Theatre
. The production ran for a disappointing 96
performances, although it had opened to a standing ovation from the
audience and a generally optimistic reaction from critics.
The Daily Telegraph
wrote, "Elaine Paige is a good sport ... enduring jokes about
her reputation for being 'difficult' with a grin that doesn't seem
all that forced. ... Only the self-importantly serious and the
chronically depressed will fail to enjoy this preposterously
entertaining evening". Paul Taylor from
The Independent was less impressed and
wrote "a miscast Elaine Paige manages to be unfunny to an almost
ingenious degree as the heroine's bibulous minder". For her
performance, Paige was nominated for a What's On Stage Award in the
category of Best Supporting Actress in a Musical.
On 28 July 2007, Paige appeared on a special celebrity version of
Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire? with
Michael Ball to raise money for
charity, winning £64,000 in a combined effort. Paige danced the
Tango on
Sport
Relief does Strictly Come Dancing with
Matt Dawson in March 2008 to raise money for
Sport Relief, where Paige and Dawson
came second overall.
She opened the Llangollen
International
Musical Eisteddfod in July 2008, performing some of her
well-known songs from her 40-year career. She will next
start her world tour, with dates in China, America and Australia.
To celebrate 40 years since her professional stage debut, in
October 2008 Paige released a picture-based autobiography,
Memories. Paige has expressed an interest in singing a
duet with
Britain's Got
Talent contender,
Susan Boyle,
after Boyle had cited Paige as her idol.
Personal life
Paige has neither married nor had children, although she had an
11-year affair with the lyricist
Tim Rice
throughout the 1980s. She has said that she wanted to have
children, but "it's a wonderful life I have, so I'm very fulfilled
in other ways".
During
the run of Sunset Boulevard at the Adelphi
Theatre
in 1995, Paige discovered a lump in her breast,
prompting her to consult her doctor, who at first reassured her
there was nothing to be concerned about. She returned twice,
and her doctor subsequently sent her for tests that confirmed the
lump was cancerous, nine months after she discovered it. She
continued her role in the production and stated, "When I did the
show I became very emotional. Some of the lyrics suddenly took on
an entirely different meaning. Words like, 'as if we never said
goodbye' became more real". Paige went in for day surgery on a
Sunday due to her theatre commitments, had five years of medical
treatment and completed a radiation programme. She spoke for the
first time of her encounter with
breast
cancer in a 2004 interview, and has since described the period
as "the most awful thing that’s happened to me in my life". During
her time in
The King and I, her mother was diagnosed with
cancer. Despite Paige wanting to pull out of the show, her mother
insisted that she should continue until her contract had finished,
and Paige's sister, Marion Billings, admitted, "That was very hard
for Elaine, having to go on stage night after night knowing she
wanted to be with Mum".
Paige has sometimes been described as "difficult".
The Times' Brian Logan wrote, "Paige is not
exactly known for her humility. In newspaper profiles, that dread
word 'difficult' is often applied". On one occasion, she told a
male interviewer that she was going to stop giving interviews to
female reporters because, in her own words, "I don't trust other
women in these situations. They establish a sisterhood with you and
then betray it every time". What was perceived to be a cold side to
her personality was also noted by Logan, but Paige has expressed
the view that a common misconception of her is that she is
confident and very serious. Another editor perceived her to be
"refreshingly down-to-earth" and "very friendly".
Paige is a patron of a number of charities. She supports the Breast
Cancer Care and The Lupus Trust, after being diagnosed as a
Lupus sufferer in 1989.
Paige has
been involved with The Children's Trust for 15 years, as well
as choosing one other charity to support every year, such as
Red
Cross
. She also supports Everychild, for whom she made a publicised trip
to Peru
in February
2003.
Views on theatre
Though Paige has enjoyed a long career in musical theatre, she
rarely goes to watch musicals, much preferring to watch films or
plays. Furthermore, she considers herself primarily an actress
before a singer, stating, "I really prefer to be in character".
Comparing the work of Rodgers and Hammerstein to that of Lloyd
Webber, Paige has said that she finds Rodgers and Hammerstein more
difficult and formal to sing, and described it as challenging. She
concluded, "it's a quieter kind of singing, more controlled, not
belting it out".
Paige has said of the physical demands of performing in theatre:
"Musical theatre is the hardest thing any actor will ever do. You
become obsessive about sleeping, eating the right food, not
speaking and giving yourself vocal rest and keeping exercised".
Regarding the pressure of having to be in a fit condition to
perform in theatre each night, she remarked "you wouldn't want to
read the letters people write when you're off and they're
disappointed — it's so awful, the guilt one feels for not being
there". As part of a rigorous routine before musical roles to look
after her voice, Paige stops eating
dairy
products and drinking alcohol and also focuses on keeping fit.
After about three months into the production when her voice is
tiring from performing, she even gives up her social life,
sometimes only communicating by notepad and fax. She also never
reads her reviews from critics, finding that it is not helpful to
have too many opinions.
Paige has named reality television series such as
Any Dream Will Do, which
aim to find an unknown actor to play the lead role in a musical, as
the greatest threat to theatre today, believing that "actors
already striving in the theatre wouldn't dream of putting
themselves on these shows". In a later interview, she questioned
the seriousness of the actors auditioning for these types of shows:
"you wouldn't put yourself up for one of those shows in case you
got bumped off the first week and all your colleagues saw it". She
has also expressed a wish for more new musicals to be put into
production, instead of frequent revivals.
Stage roles
Discography
Solo albums
Cast recordings
| Year |
Album title |
Other notes |
| 1974 |
Billy |
Original London Cast Recording |
| 1978 |
The Barrier: A Love Story |
1978 London Studio Cast Recording |
| 1978 |
Evita |
Original London Cast Recording |
| 1981 |
Cats |
Original London Cast Recording |
| 1984 |
Chess |
|
| 1989 |
Anything Goes |
1989 London Cast Recording |
| 1992 |
Nine |
|
| 2000 |
The King and I |
2000 London Cast Recording |
Other albums and guest appearances
| Year |
Album title |
Other notes |
| 1998 |
Songs from Whistle Down the Wind |
Recording of the song "If Only" |
| 2000 |
Michael Ball -
Christmas |
Duet on "As Long As There's Christmas" |
| 2001 |
Andrew Lloyd Webber — Masterpiece |
Live
recording of concert at the Great Hall of the People , Beijing, China. |
Videos and DVDs
| Year |
Album title |
Other notes |
| 1985 |
Lyrics by Tim Rice |
Performances of "Don't Cry for Me Argentina" and "I Know Him So
Well" |
| 1991 |
Elaine Paige in
Concert |
Live
recording at the Birmingham Symphony Hall of 1991 concert tour |
| 1998 |
Andrew Lloyd Webber — Celebration |
Live performances of "Don't Cry for Me Argentina" and
"Memory" |
| 2001 |
Andrew Lloyd Webber — Masterpiece |
Live performances of "Don't Cry for Me Argentina", "The Heart
is Slow to Learn", "Memory", "The Perfect Year", "As If We Never
Said Goodbye", "No Matter What" and "Ni Yong You Wo De Wei Lai —
Friends for Life" (The Chinese translation of "Amigos Para
Siempre") |
References
External links
then the Theatre Royal, Brighton
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