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Noël Coward

The Knitting Circle: Theatre

Biography,work,bibliography,press cuttings,web site.

British actor, playwright, and composer.

He was born and raised in Teddington.

He began acting in January 1911 at the age of 12, playing Prince Mussel inThe Goldfishby Lila Field. At 14 he appeared inPeter Pan. He also appeared as a teenager in a D. W. Griffith film.

His first play written with Esme Wynne was written in 1917.

He was first sole author of his own play withI'll Leave It to You, in 1920. He shot to fame in 1924 as the writer and star of the playThe Vortex.

His work is full of frivolity, satire, and wit.

Noël Coward visited Jamaica during the Second World War and fell in love with it. In 1947 he built a home called Blue Harbour on the north coast of the island. He soon found that he attracted a lot of celebrity visitors and built a second home as a retreat called Firefly. Among his visitors wereJohn Gielgud, Vivien Leigh, and Laurence Olivier. Other celebrities who also had homes in the area included Claudette Colbert, Bette Davis, Errol Flynn, andIvor Novello.

He never referred publicly to his own homosexuality, and would not allow his biographer Sheridan Morley to mention it, because of fears of losing royalties. He seemed to believe that the public was unsure about his sexuality, despite him writing and singing songs likeMad About the Boy. HisA Song at Twilighthas the closeted character Sir Hugh Latymer who is based onSomerset Maugham. His playPoint Valaineis dedicated to Somerset Maugham.

Noël Coward is the model for the character Beverly Carlton inThe Man Who Came to Dinner, (1939), by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman.

In 1962 Graham Payn askedPeter Greenwellto play piano for Noël Coward. He did so many times until Noël Coward's death. Peter Greenwell went on to play and sing tributes to Noël Coward.

Later in life, when Noël Coward's plays were out of favour, he mostly earned his living as a cabaret performer, singing such songs asMad Dogs and Englishmen(from his reviewWords and Music),Why must the show go on, andThere are bad times just around the corner.

He appeared in films, for example,The Italian Job, (1969).

There is a Blue Plaque at 131 Waldegrave Road, Teddington where Noël Coward was born. Another Blue Plaque is 56 Lenham Road, Sutton where he lived.

In 1999 the inaugural Noël Coward Conference was held at Birmingham University.Peter Greenwellsang a tribute at the piano. Noël Coward's archive of 60 plays and more than 300 popular songs was bequeathed to Birmingham University by his longtime companion, Graham Payn.

James Gardiner's "e;Who's a Pretty Boy Then?, (1996), shows a black and white photograph of Noël Coward with Lillian Braithwaite inThe Vortex(1924) on page 57, and a black and white photograph of Noël Coward on page 58.

The National Portrait Gallery has a bronze bust of Noël Coward by Clemence Dane (Winifred Ashton), (c1939).

• I'll Leave It to You, 1920, a play.

• The Vortex, 1924, a play.

• Fallen Angel's, 1925, a play.

• Easy Virtue, 1925, a play.

• Hay Fever, 1925, a play.

• The Queen was in the Parlour, 1927, a play, subsequently made into a film.

• Sirocco, 1927, a play, (with the lead played byIvor Novello).

• This Year of Grace, 1928, a review.

• Bitter Sweet, 1929, an operetta.

• Private Lives, 1930, a play.

• Cavalcade, 1931, a play.
  Judas's march-pastby Philip Hoare inThe Times Literary Supplement, 10th. December, 1999, page 19. A review of a production at Citizens' Theatre, Glasgow. "e; . . . it wasCavalcadethat turned the intelligentsia against Coward. Up to that point,Virginia Woolf, among others, had confessed herself 'in love' with the decorative ornament of the salons of Ladies Colefax and Cunard. When Coward published his anti-war polemic,Post-Mortem, just a year beforeCavalcade, it seemed he was playing up to their expectations, ready to rub along with the Pylon Boys of the next decade. ButCavalcadedestroyed all that. 'A play which makes me rage', thundered Ethel Mannin, objecting to such obsequious class portrayal; Sean O'Casey called it 'but the march-past of the hinder parts of England, her backside draped with a Union Jack'. Even the cat-lovingBeverley Nicholswas minded to snap, 'That play is about the finest essay in betrayal since Judas Iscariot', arguing that Coward had written the play to ingratiate himself with the middle classes - presumably the same people who bought the serailization of the play in theDaily Mail(as with the rest of his output, Coward was an adept self-publicist)."e;

• Words and Music, 1932, a review.

• Design for Living, 1933, a play.

• Hands Across the Sea, 1936, a play.

• Present Indicative, 1937, an autobiography.

• Blithe Spirit, 1941, a play.

• In Which We Serve, 1942, a film, scripted and directed. Ranked at 92nd. position among 'British' films by the British Film Institute survey in 1999.

• The Happy Breed, 1943, a play.

• Present Laughter, 1943, a play.

• Blithe Spirit, 1945, a film, scripted and directed.

• Brief Encounter, 1945, a film, scripted and directed.
  Brief Encounter, 1999, edited by Sheridan Morley, Faber, 96 pages, ISBN 0571196802.

• Sigh No More, 1945, a review.

• Tonight at 8:30, 1952, a play, subsequently made into a film.

• After the Ball, 1954, a musical based onOscar Wilde'sLady Windermere's Fan. See theMay 1999 revival.

• Future Indefinite, 1954, an autobiography.

• Point Valaine, 1955, a play.

• Nude With Violin, 1956, a play.

• Volcano, 1956, a play. Not performed until 2000.
  An Englishman Abroadby Philip Hoare inThe Independent on Sunday: The Sunday Review, 23rd. April, 2000, pages 14-16. "e;This week, an Essex theatre will hold the world premier of an unperformed, unpublished Noël Coward play.Volcano, which has languished in the archives since the 1950s, has been dusted down and directed at the Palace Theatre, Westcliff, by television's favourite Inspector Dalgliesh, Roy Marsden, with an exceptionally youthful cast and an eye to the West End."e;

  "e;On a fictional Caribbean island, a widow in her early 40s, Adele Shelley, is faced with the ghosts of her passionate past when handsome Lothario Guy Littleton returns on a visit and seduces a young married woman, Ellen Danbury. When the lovers' respective spouses, Melissa Littleton and Keith Danbury, arrive, the plot is further complicated by the revelation that Keith also turns out to have been in love with Guy. The play's overt discussion of sex - and the inclusion of a gay relationship - was not what Coward's now middle-aged audiences expected of him. His producer, Binkie Beaumont, turned down the play on the grounds of its construction; but may have envisaged problems getting it past the censors of the Lord Chamberlain's Office."e;

• Waiting in the Wings, 1960, a play.

  'There is a lot of old shop talked and a lot of old songs sung, and it gets more nauseating ... as the evening wears on.'

  T. C. Worsley

• A Song at Twilight, 1966, a play. See theJanuary 1999 revival.

• Out in The Midday Sun. The paintings of Noel Coward, 1988, edited by Sheridan Morley, New York: Philosophical Library.

• The Noël Coward Diaries, 1991, edited Graham Payn and Sheridan Morley, Phoenix, 704 pages, ISBN 0753805472 (paperback).

• Autobiography, 1992, edited by Sheridan Morley, Mandarin, 512 pages, ISBN 0749314133 (paperback).

• Collected Plays: Six, 1999, Methuen, 415 pages, ISBN 0 413 73410 2.

• Collected Plays: Seven, 1999, Methuen, 381 pages, ISBN 0 413 73400 2.

• Collected Revue Sketches and Parodies, 1999, Methuen, 282 pages, ISBN 0 413 73390 4.

• Noël Coward: A Life in Quotes, 1999, compiled by Barry Day, Metro, 116 pages, ISBN 1 900 51284 X.

• Noël Coward: The Complete Lyrics, 1999, edited by Barry Day, Methuen, 352 pages, ISBN 0 413 73230 4.

• Tom Cowan,Gay Men and Women Who Enriched the World.

• Elliman and Roll, (1986), pages 48-49.

• Joel KaplanandSheila Stowell, (editors), (2000), "e;Look Back in Pleasure: Noël Coward reconsidered"e;, Methuen, 238 pages, ISBN 0 413 75500 2.
  Family gamesby Judith Flanders inThe Times Literary Supplement, 12th. January, 2001, page 20. "e;Last year was the centenary of Noël Coward's birth, and he was, suddenly, everywhere once more."e; "e;There was also a conference to mark the centenary, and to inaugurate a Coward Study Centre at the University of Birmingham. This book is a collection of the papers given at the conference."e;

• John Lahr, (1982), "e;Coward the Playwright"e;, New York: Avon Books.

• Cole Lesley, (1976), "e;Remembered Laughter: The Life of Noel Coward"e;, London: Jonathan Cape.

• Joseph Morella and George Mazzei, (1996), "e;Genuis and Lust: The Creativity and Sexuality of Cole Porter and Noel Coward"e;, London: Robson Books, 276 pages, ISBN 1 86105 014 3.

• Sheridan Morley, (1969), "e;A Talent to Amuse"e;.

• Sheridan Morley, (1999), "e;Quotable Noël Coward"e;, Running Press.

• Coward faked ME to evade warinThe Pink Paper, 13th. November, 1998, issue 558, page 5. "e;The gay playwright and actor Noel Coward was pensioned off from the army during the First World War without ever leaving England, according to documents released this week. He faked the symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome to evade active service."e;

• Raise statues to people, not concepts, by Ian Jack inThe Independent, 12th. December, 1998, page 7. "e;His old friend, the Queen Mother, unveiled him last week. He also flaunts a cigarette - this may now be his most daring aspect - and we meet him, like Wilde, at the same level. No need to look up. Coward sits down while Shakespeare in another corner stands above us, pointing with a quill at a manuscript."e;

• Reviews of a revival ofA Song at Twilightat The King's Head, London.
  • Coward's song a little off-key
  by Paul Taylor inThe Independent, 5th. January, 1999, page 7. "e;The Noel Coward Centenary Year opens with a revival of the play that brought his stage career to a critically commended close.A Song at Twilight- now directed in a shortened version by Coward's first biographer, Sheridan Morley - was part of the 1966 trilogy,A Suit in Three Keys, with which Coward signed off as a playwright and a leading actor. It was also the Coward play in which homosexuality arose as an 'issue' rather than just an atmosphere. Set in a Swiss hotel, it focusses on Sir Hugo Latymer, an eminent, elderly writer who, unlike Coward, has resorted to the camouflage of a long, presumably sexless, marriage."e;

  "e;. . . Corin Redgrave's fine account of Hugo pulsates with all the petulant self-centredness and grandeur of someone who has spent his life as Queen Bee in a silk dressing gown."e;

  "e;Corin has written a wonderfully sensitive book about the bisexual double life of his late father, Sir Michael Redgrave, (which included an affair with Coward). This understanding deepens and dignifies his performance."e;

• Half-way out of the closetby Paul Taylor inThe Independent: The Wednesday Review, 6th. January, 1999, page 11. "e;Noel Coward used to maintain that his refusal to come clean about being gay sprang from a solicitous wish not to disillusion all those harmless middle-aged ladies in Goring-by-Sea who 'harboured secret desires' for him. But there was also the tiny matter of the laws of England which in 1967, made him a criminal. Then again, the conjunction in his work of a gay sensibility and ostensibly heterosexual relations had a potent across-the-board appeal. Can a man forced to lead a double life sacrifice too much in the interests of success? What emotional damage does concealment inflict?"e;

• Now we're going to cryby Lindsay Duguid inThe Times Literary Supplement, 15th. January, 1999. "e;OfSong of Twilight, Coward said: 'It is perhaps the most serious play I have ever written'."e; "e;In his biography of Coward, Philip Hoare claims that it may have been inspired by the death in September 1965 ofSomerset Maugham, whose recently published bitchy autobiography,Looking Back, contained the admission of his homosexuality; and whose treatment of his alcoholic ex-secretary Gerald Haxton seems to parallel Hugo's affair with Perry Sheldon. Here Coward seems to be contemplating the implication of revealing his own lifelong homosexuality. The play's attitude to the subject, which veers between the anxious 'not normal', the cautious 'illegal' and the cheerful 'as queer as a coot', presumably follows the playwright's own ambivalent cogitations. In the end, Sir Hugo decides, as Coward himself did, that his public are not ready for this sort of revelation, but the pain and dishonesty involved in this position have been aired."e;

• Redgrave family in tune for Coward revivalby David Benedict inThe Independent, 21st. October, 1999, page 10. "e;When Jason Donovan successfully suedThe Faceover its publication of an article falsely accusing him of hypocrisy over his sexuality he proved two things. Firstly, litigation is not always the answer: he won, but his persistence in proving his heterosexuality damaged his career. Secondly, the mere allegation of homosexuality can potentially still be construed as damaging. Imagine how much higher the stakes were in 1966 when homosexuality was still a criminal offence. That's the crux of Noel Coward'sSong at Twilight, now glossily revived by Coward's godson, Sheridan Morley, with a trio of Redgraves."e;

Melody makerby Ian Bostridge inThe Guardian Review, 28th. September, 2002, page 17. "e;Nearly 30 years after Noël Coward's death, his reputation as a dramatist stands at a new peak. Received into the great tradition of English comedy, he is now seen as a precursor of Beckett and Pinter.Private Lives, triumphantly revived by Howard Davies in London and New York last season, is recognised as one of the masterpieces of world theatre."e;

"e;The question of Coward's stature as a tunesmith is, in the end, a subjective one; it may be that the melodic subtlety of his songs, their harmonic twists and turns, makes them more perishable than the great standards of the American tradition. But I would maintain that Coward is closer to the continental traditions of the time than the American comparison allows. I would argue that music stands at the centre of Coward's art and cannot be ignored as if he were a brilliant playwright who just happened to write a few famous songs."e;

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First uploaded 18th. August, 1998

Last altered 6th. September, 2006