Christine Ebersole

During Christine's triumphant return engagement at New York's Cafe Carlyle during January 2011, the critics couldn't stop raving and the patrons couldn't stop coming:

Stephen Holden, The New York Times: "A sneak attack: that’s what you might call the moment in Christine Ebersole’s brilliant new show at the Café Carlyle when the merriment pauses, and she delivers a riveting dramatic performance of "Another Winter in a Summer Town"... the song is a crushing moment of self-awareness and an acknowledgment of personal defeat by Little Edie Beale, whom Ms. Ebersole portrayed in the Broadway musical "Grey Gardens".

At Ms. Ebersole’s opening-night, the song was attached to "Drift Away," a lesser-known number from "Grey Gardens" that further deepened what might be described as an aching Proustian reverie of happier times gone by. The audience response was thunderous.

Although Ms. Ebersole’s emotional raid seemed to come out of nowhere, it was actually a carefully prepared moment of truth in a show whose songs and witty patter are about youth and age and Hollywood illusions. With her gifted director Scott Wittman, Ms. Ebersole seems to share a telepathic kinship in which multiple personalities reveal themselves as one number segues into another. By the time the show ended with "Young at Heart," Proustian melancholy had morphed into the euphoria encapsulated by the wise DeSylva-Brown-Henderson catchphrase that is hard to live by, as easy as it sounds: "Live and laugh at it all."

Ben Brantley, The New York Times: "Ever since last Saturday night I’ve been hearing voices. One of them is a clear, righteous soprano that recalls Joan Baez, another is a lilting, silvery curlicue like that of the soubrette in an operetta from the gaslight era; then there’s the sassy "Hello, boys" trumpet of a girl singer with a big band; and, most hauntingly, there’s the glasslike voice that seems to exist expressly as a container for the shimmering pain within.

All those voices belong to Christine Ebersole, and she uses every one of them – and more – in her unmissable cabaret act at the Cafe Carlyle. I have long been an admirer of Ms. Ebersole’s versatility as a New York actress in musicals (and plays, too, but the subject today is song). Listening to the range of her technique packed into roughly an hour of performance time pushed my admiration into something like awe. The effect was like watching a master class with Laurence Olivier, in which the actor transformed himself, without stripping a gear, into a tragic Shakespearean hero, a seedy John Osborne down-and-outer and a fop according to Congreve.

That Ms. Ebersole has this gift of emotional expansiveness, too, was piercingly evident in her set at the Carlyle. In the show’s most wrenching moment, she sang "Another Winter in a Summer Town," Ms. Ebersole filled the room with a pure incandescent sorrow that somehow seemed to belong to everyone.This is in no way to denigrate other great musical actresses of the moment, a short list that would have to include Bernadette Peters, Patti LuPone, Audra McDonald,Elaine Stritch and Kristin Chenoweth. What these women have in common with Ms. Ebersole and Ms. Murphy is an ability to make song feel like a privileged extension of speech: a means of distilling and magnifying emotions into a heightened state of clarity. And without that gift – which the extraordinary singer (and former Broadway ingénue) Barbara Cook is still practicing brilliantly in her 80s – all the technical virtuosity in the world doesn’t mean a thing."

Rex Reed, NY Observer: "Perfection is not an overused word in the cabaret world, but I use it without reservation when making even a feeble effort to describe Christine Ebersole's dynamic, touching, beautifully conceived new act at the Café Carlyle. Unencumbered by the phony titles and pointless concepts that plague other "theme" shows, she simply steps to the postage-stamp stage, splendid and glowing bright like a sunflower nourished by neon, shaking her fluffy blond coif in her above-the-knee black sleeveless dress garnished with perfectly placed pearls, opens up her heart and sings. What she sings, so sure and clear it makes your liver dance, is the first swinging jazz version of "Ding! Dong! The Witch Is Dead" since the June Christy album The Cool School. It is enchanting.

In a class by herself, she dazzles with a scrubbed smile of pure Pepsodent. She has a real feel for time and rhythm, and an awesome range that runs the gamut from classical to jazz and Broadway show tunes with equal bazazz. And she finds new ways to refurbish old tunes in ways that knock you lopsided....She brings New York's often reserved, seen-it-all ringside high rollers to a screaming standing ovation. I've seen her in every incarnation, but this is undiluted perfection. She is in a class by herself, and missing this show is as inadvisable as burning the American flag on the steps of the Pentagon. Ms. Ebersole, with the razor sharp wit and the voice of polished taffeta, is it clear that I love you?"

Since 2000, rj has been pleased to represent Christine Ebersole in Concert. A native of Winnetka, Illinois, Christine Ebersole won The 2007 "Tony Award for Outstanding Actress" in the "role of a lifetime" as "Edie Beale" in the acclaimed Tony Nominated Broadway Musical "GREY GARDENS". Lauded with virtually every Off- Broadway theater award when it premiered at Playwrights Horizon, GREY GARDENS went on to pack its Broadway theater for over a year, with every theater critic praising Christine’s bravura performance. She starred opposite Angela Lansbury and Rupert Everett in the 2009 spring and summer Broadway hit "BLITHE SPIRIT," has enchanted audiences throughout her performing career, from the Broadway stage to television series' and specials, film, concert appearances and recordings. Currently, Christine can be seen in TV Land's new comedy series "Retired at 35."

Christine has won critical acclaim as well as the Outer Critics Circle Award and the Tony Award for Best Outstanding Actress in a Musical, for her portrayal of "Dorothy Brock" in the revival of "42nd STREET.," starred in "DINNER AT EIGHT", garnering a Tony Award nomination and starred as M'Lynn on Broadway in "STEEL MAGNOLIAS".

In concert, Christine has appeared in concert at Carnegie Hall with The San Francisco Symphony (PBS Special), multiple concerts with The Boston Pops, multiple appearances at The Kennedy Center Honors, a 2009 solo concert at The Kennedy Center and in virtually every city across the country.

In television, Christine has appeared in "Boston Legal," "Law and Order, SVU," USA's "Royal Pains," "Lipstick Jungle," "Cashmere Mafia," "Will and Grace" and ABC’s "Samantha Who." She has appeared on "The Today Show", "The View" and "The Colbert Report."

In film, Christine was featured in "Confessions of a Shopaholic," "Tootsie," "Black Sheep," Amadeus," "Dead Again," "My Favorite Martian," My Girl II," "Folks!" "and "Richie Rich."

In addition to her television, film, Broadway and concert work, Christine has released 4 CDs.