NYPost WHAT WAS SHE AFRAID OF?

By DON KAPLAN

November 6, 2001 -- BARBRA Streisand was too nervous to make an acceptance speech when she won an Emmy Sunday night, but closing the awards show with song was not a problem, she said.

That's the explanation she gave yesterday when asked why presenters said she wasn't in the theater to accept her award - but showed up an hour later to sing.

"This is just my little way of doing something because I don't enjoy public singing," Streisand said afterward. "Tonight actually had a purpose, so I was a little less afraid."

Streisand won an Emmy for best individual performance in a variety or musical program Sunday night for her Fox special "Timeless: Live in Concert."

But when it came time for her to collect the Emmy she was a no show.

At that point in the show, the singer was still in her car on the way over to Los Angeles' Shubert Theater, said Streisand's rep Dick Guttman.

"She wasn't there to get an award; she was there to express herself," Gutmann said.

"I'm just grateful we live in a country where we're allowed to sing and have music and express ourselves and our emotions," she told reporters later. "It's a very sad time in our history, a frightening time, and I wanted to give something back to the people and our country."

To close the show Streisand sang "You Will Never Walk Alone" standing in front of a wall covered with the names of victims from the 9/11 terror attacks.

The 59-year-old singer is known to suffer from mild bouts of stage-fright - especially when it comes to making acceptance speeches at televised awards shows.

Last time she was at the Emmys, "she was disappointed when suddenly she won and had to get up and say something," Guttman said "She just felt that what she had to [sing] was more important than accepting an award and she wanted to have the concentration on [her singing]."

-- Anonymous, November 06, 2001