EPOB 15th January 2012
(UNEDITED New York Roving Report for BBC R2 Elaine Paige On Sunday)

Hello, … it’s me EPOB… Elaine Paige on Broadway with my first roving report of 2012, and Happy New Year to you all and to you too, Barbara.

Hope you all had a great time and didn’t put on too much weight! Oh well its only once a year!

So what did you get up to I was working – another first – working on Christmas I never done that (funny voice) in all my years in the theatre. But it was a fun atmosphere backstage and I’m sure you got a taste of it if you heard my special on Boxing Day.

Boxing Day for us was a day off, but of course they don’t celebrate here anyway. So I went to the legendary Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular which has been thrilling audiences for nearly 80 years! The show features over 140 performers, a mule and a camel, lavish sets and costumes and an original musical score. This year they also included 3D special effects, but of course the stars of the show are the ladies dance troupe - The Rockettes. Their precision and choreography is like Busby Berkeley and amazing to see live. A must see New York tradition first presented in 1933, and seen by more than a million visitors a year. Well worth it.

Anybody in New York on New Year’s Eve stays well away from Times Sq. This year more than a million people gathered to watch the ball drop. They start arriving at mid-day and once you get there you can’t get out. All the surrounding streets were closed at 1pm by the police, so our matinee was brought forward and by the time I came out at 3 you couldn’t come out of the stage door, so I had to walk out the front entrance and then walk several blocks downtown before I could get across to the east side of Broadway.

I decided dinner downtown was the best option and the ideal way to celebrate and I was right. We enjoyed a fabulous supper at the wonderful Gramercy tavern and then got back to the apartment just in time to watch the Times Square ball drop on TV. That suited me just fine, and as I looked out of my window on the 38th floor I could see all the ticker tape and confetti sailing past the window. A great sight to witness … in the comfort of my apartment!

New Years Day was a crisp and sunny day – not a cloud in the sky, so we decided to be rather romantic and take a wonderful horse drawn carriage ride through Central Park followed by tea at the beautiful Plaza – hope you saw my Tweets.

The hotel has been standing here since 1907 and is probably most famous for its Oak Room Bar and also the books written about Eloise - by Kay Thompson. Tea was delicious and well worth a visit

I’ve also managed to get to the movies and two of my favourites were the silent movie ‘The Artist’ and also Martin Scorcese’s ‘Hugo’ - both a visual feast for the eyes.

And I finally got to see The Book of Mormon. It’s as shocking to audiences today as Hair was in my youth and you can’t believe you are laughing at such rudery but laugh we did. And the performance by young Andrew Rannalls, who you might have heard me interview in one of my specials over Christmas, lived up to all expectations.

Well there’s only a few more weeks of Follies so next time I speak to you I’ll nearly be (sing) “free again” and thinking of being homeward bound

But until then I’m Still Here and I send you lots of love and happiness for 2012!