Christine Ebersole And Life As an Empty-Nester

If you watch network television, you may best know Christine Ebersole for her role on Bob Hearts Abishola. If you love musicals, you’ll probably know Ebersole for her Tony Award-winning roles in 42nd Street and Grey Gardens. What you may not know is that she and her husband, Bill Moloney, adopted and raised three children: Elijah, Mae Mae and Aron.

All three children have grown up and moved out of the family home – leaving Ebersole and Moloney as empty-nesters. It was a topic Ebersole addressed in her return to the Café Carlyle in New York in 2016 in a showed entitled After the Ball. That show serves as the foundation for a record of the same name which finds Ebersole singing such songs as The Way You Look Tonight, Lazy Afternoon, May Baby Just Cares for Me and A Sleeping’ Bee.

Two weeks ago we spoke about this change in her life, the recordings she made for After the Ball and we began our conversation talking about the passing of her colleague in the 2009 Broadway revival of Noël Coward’s Blithe Spirit, Angela Lansbury.

What follows are excerpts from our conversation that have been edited for length and clarity.

What is your favorite memory of working with Angela Lansbury?

Angela Lansbury was always an inspiration to me because I just I loved her work. I loved her personality. I loved her persona. When I had the privilege of working with her in Blithe Spirit she really confirmed everything that I felt about her. She really raised the bar in terms of excellence in the theater and she never missed a show. Her energy was always 100% onstage and off. She really kept the bar high. 

She won five Tony Awards and then got a special Tony this year. You, so far, have two. In your 2001 acceptance speech you made a point of thanking your three children. Clearly being a mother has been an important part of your life. At what point did you decide to do a show about life once children have left the nest?

I think that was the inspiration when they left the nest. You’re left feeling where do I go from here kind of thing. That’s really what the inspiration is. How do we continue? It was it was not only the children leaving the nest, but I’m nearing my dotage. So it was really where do we go from here?

Is that something that you had contemplated in advance of their leaving?

No, no, no. You’re too busy in it. You can’t think about the other stuff. You’re hoping that’s a result of good parenting that they can go off and be on their own. But the reality of it is different.

The album was was recorded in 2016 after you had done the show at Café Carlyle. You felt that there was something off with the recording. What changed in your perception about the recording when you revisited those tracks several years later?

During the time that we were we were recording it, there were just things that were happening that made the situation very fraught. One of the players’ wives was very ill, so he was not able to perform on the days that we were supposed to be at the studio. The engineer was new. This just skewed our perception of what we were doing. That’s really what it was about. So I thought, well, we’re going to have to really re-record all this. Five years later we went back and found buried treasure.

What surprised you most when you went back and revisit those tracks?

I think what surprised me most was what I had perceived and how the perception was not true. But it was informed by all these crazy things that were happening around us at the time – the things that we couldn’t control.

Your rendition of Autumn Leaves that appears on the album is the second version you recorded for After the Ball. Is there a fundamental difference between the two versions? 

No, we just kind of re-imagined it. I wanted [guitarist] Larry Saltzman, who was not able to be on the [first] recording. He was originally in the show. That number was always very special with Larry and myself when we performed it live. Jon Bernthal, who came in to take over for Larry, was just amazing. There were incredible things that came out of a very difficult situation. 

How did you find your way and your approach into this song that has been recorded so many times? 

The reason why I wanted to do Autumn Leaves was because it resonates in terms of parents and children, particularly September when you go off to school again. And every year they’re getting older until finally one year they’re going off to college and they’re not going to be coming back for lunch or dinner. It’s a time of reflection. It’s a time of a sentiment and melancholy. You see the brilliance of the leaves, the autumn leaves, knowing that they’re going to be gone soon. So it’s a time of reflection.

You were quoted once as having said, “Family transcends the flesh. You don’t love someone because they look like you, you love their spirit. It’s the soul connection.” What does this album allow us to learn about the spirit and the connection that you and your children have?

Our story is one of adoption. All of our children are adopted and they’re all from different cultures and different races. I believe that they were brought by God. That God has a purpose for our lives. It’s not some random thing that God chose this family. He made this family what it is.

It really is the spirit of who they are that you so appreciate. Think about it in your own family, in a family that’s biologically connected. The personalities can be quite different. Sometimes you think, well, where did you come from? How are you related to any of this? It just really becomes very evident that we’re born of spirit.

Now that they are pursuing their dreams, what freedom does it give you to pursue new dreams of your own? 

I’ve just been very blessed my whole life. [I have] been given opportunities to do so many different things. Right now I’m in Los Angeles filming a television show for CBS with Chuck Lorre – Bob Hearts Abishola. Tomorrow I’m going down to New Orleans to do a concert in Riverton and sing at a someone’s private party on Sunday. I have this album that’s been a dream of mine that came true. You don’t know what tomorrow’s going to bring. So it’s good to put your teeth in and put your wig on and keep going.

Do you want to revisit things that you have always enjoyed? Or do you want to experience the things that you haven’t and try to sort out what you want the rest of your time to be? Are those considerations that you have had? 

I think the lockdown of the last three years really kind of informed a lot for me because I’ve been in the business for 50 years and I really kind of was on a fast track, a fast lane and I was taken off that fast lane. If I am not on the fast lane who am I? I only knew myself on the fast lane. But I don’t want to be in the fast lane anymore. I’ve been able to really kind of slow down and just kind of smell the roses in a way that I never really had time to before.

What does it mean to you to be back on stage? 

When everything was locked down it was a very difficult time. I thought, well, I guess I’m not going to do that anymore. Then I was invited to go to Morocco to do a one night concert in Tangier of Follies. The last time I was on the stage with a group of actors was three years prior in Tangier doing A Little Night Music. There was this very defining moment that happened when I was backstage.

I remember having a lot of doubts about it. I sang I’m Still Here. I was having a lot of fears and doubts about it. I thought, I can’t do this. I can’t memorize it. I don’t trust myself. This is something that’s in the past and it’s not going to be in the future and this and that.

The beautiful overture’s playing and the Follies girls are on the stage. All of a sudden I was like this child in my heart. The fear all went away because all I was seeing was the magic. I just thought it’s in my blood. So I can’t turn away what’s already in me. I sang I’m Still Here and it had a resonance because I was still here after everything that everybody’s been through in the last few years. It was God’s way of confirming don’t turn away from it because it’s a part of you.

Let me conclude our conversation, Christine, by taking you back to December 13th, 1977, which was the opening night of Green Pond. That was a show that asked you to imitate the munchkins in The Wizard of Oz. In September of that same year you made your television debut as Pearl Miller in Ryan’s Hope. From those early days of your career to where you are today, what is most important for you about the journey that you’ve had so far as an artist and separately as a mother?

I think it’s face forward because that’s where you’re going to. That’s where the audience is. That’s where opportunity is and that’s where life is. I think that’s the same in career and in motherhood. Never be afraid to learn something new. Never be afraid to change the perception of what you thought was true. Might not be. Truth is around the corner. 

Main photo: Christine Ebersole (Photo by Kit Kittle/Courtesy Club 44 Records)

Update: Cultural Attaché erroneously listed Ms. Ebersole’s husband with whom she adopted their three children. It was not Peter Bergman as originally stated, but rather Bill Moloney. We have updated the story and apologize for the error.