FAREWELL: Staffers at The Carlyle salute longtime resident Elaine Stritch, 88, yesterday as the actress exited (above) for her trip home to Michigan.
FAREWELL: Staffers at The Carlyle salute longtime resident Elaine Stritch, 88, yesterday as the actress exited (inset) for her trip home to Michigan. (
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The curtain came down yesterday on Elaine Stritch’s long stay in New York — and at The Carlyle.
The 88-year-old deliciously salty, brassy voiced, irascible Broadway babe, cabaret legend and New York fixture was heading home to Michigan after 71 years here.
The elegant Madison Avenue hotel where she lived for a decade scripted a surprise for her grand exit.
When Stritch stepped off the elevator from the third floor and walked a few steps to the lobby, she saw 35 hotel employees, including housekeeping, front-desk and kitchen staffers, engineers and managers lined up — all applauding and cheering.
“She was in shock,’’ said a source who witnessed the actress, clad in her trademark black leggings, white shirt, big round, black-framed glasses and black hat, make her way down the line shaking hands and hugging those she knew well.
“It was very sweet, and she was actually a little emotional,’’ the source said.
Stritch promised the staffers, “Don’t worry, you’ll still get your muffins at Christmas!’’
It was an annual tradition that the actress/singer “would always deliver hundreds of boxes of Bays English Muffins to the staff every December,’’ said one longtime employee.
“I’ll be back,’’ Stritch pledged. Then she headed to a waiting car with family members escorting her back to the state she left in 1942, a source said.
The Emmy-winning star and longtime Stephen Sondheim interpreter announced last month that she is moving back to Birmingham, Mich., to be closer to her nieces and nephews.
“I loved being on Broadway, but performing has become exhausting, and I just don’t want to live in New York anymore,’’ she told The New York Times.
“I’m just sick of the competition in New York, the feeling that I always have to rehearse to keep up my performance. I don’t feel like rehearsing, even though it should be my favorite thing in the world to do.
“I just don’t have the energy, darling. I’m 88! I don’t look or always feel it, but I’m 88.’’
The feisty showbiz veteran said farewell earlier this month with five performances at the Cafe Carlyle.
Her opening night drew celeb fans, including Tony Bennett, Liza Minnelli, Bernadette Peters, Martin Short and Tom Hanks.
“Everybody pay their bill?’’ she asked at the end of the night. “It’s a shocker!’’