Ramone to Produce New Elaine Paige CD; Tour Possible

Actress, recording artist, producer and broadcaster Elaine Paige, regarded on both sides of the Atlantic as ‘The First Lady of Musical Theatre,' has arrived in New York City where she will spend the next few months pursuing a variety of professional opportunities. Her primary mission is to record a new Warner Bros album with international recording stars to be produced by the legendary Phil Ramone.

While in the Big Apple, Ms. Paige will also tape her popular weekly BBC 2 Radio program Elaine Paige on Sunday, which will originate from a studio in Manhattan. The program, which marked its fifth anniversary this year, is devoted to musical theatre and film music and, with its mix of music, competitions and interviews, continues to delight its audiences which now reaches over 2-million listeners each week. She will be looking to interview internationally renowned figures from the entertainment world - actors, writers, producers, directors, broadcast personalities and such - whose achievements will be of interest to her British audiences.

During her stay in New York she will also seek out potential producers who might be interested in presenting a Broadway production and/or North American tour of Elaine Paige Live - Celebrating A Life on Stage, a stage performance/concert focusing on highlights of her more than 40 year show business career which recently completed an international world tour that included SRO engagements in the UK, Scandinavia, Ireland, China, Australia and New Zealand. One of the Australian performances was videotaped and was broadcast this past June on PBS in the US. Also in release are a CD of that concert as well as a retrospective book, Elaine Paige Live - Celebrating A Life on Stage, published by Oberon Books and available from Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble and the Drama Bookstore in NYC.

During her illustrious career, Elaine has starred in numerous West End and Broadway productions and performed in concert internationally, sweeping to fame more than 40 years ago with her award winning performance as ‘Eva Peron' in Evita. She subsequently created the role of ‘Grizabella' in Cats, from which the classic song Memory became the first of her many hit records.
Her further theatre productions include Hair, Jesus Christ Superstar, Grease, Billy, Chess, Anything Goes, Piaf, Sunset Boulevard (in London and on Broadway), The King and I and Sweeney Todd (with the New York City Opera). She has worked twice with Sir Peter Hall's famous Theatre Company in The Misanthrope and Feydeau's Where There's a Will.

Elaine has performed in concert worldwide from The White House in Washington, DC, to The Great Hall of People in Beijing, from the Bolshoi in Moscow to Sydney Opera House. She has appeared in many television roles including her own TV specials and Royal Variety Shows. She has recorded 20 solo albums (four multi-Platinum and eight consecutive Gold), six cast albums and has been honored with many awards: Society of West End Theatre Award (now known as the Olivier Awards) for Best Actress in a Musical (‘Eva Peron' in Evita) and Variety Club Award for Show Business Personality of the Year (1978); Variety Club Award for Musical Artiste (1986) and Variety Club Award for Best Actress (1995); Gold Badge of Merit from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (1994); HMV Lifetime Achiev3ment Award (1996); Order of the British Empire for services to Musical Theatre (1995); Drama Desk Award nomination (2004) as Outstanding Actress in a Musical for her role as ‘Mrs. Lovett' in Sweeney Todd; and Variety Club Special Presentation for 40 Years on Stage (2009).

She returned to the West End stage in 2007 to critical acclaim in the role of ‘The Drowsy Chaperone/Beatrice Stockwell' in The Drowsy Chaperone at the Novello Theatre for which she received a What's On Stage Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress in a Musical. She recently recorded a track with Secret Garden, The Things You Are To Me, for the group's new Number One quadruple-platinum selling album.

Elaine's recent television work has included the role of ‘Doris Bunner' in Agatha Christie's Ms. Marple story, A Murder Is Announced for Granada/WGBH, and a guest star role in Where The Heart Is for Granada Television.