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130-529: The Marquise is a romantic comedy play by Noël Coward , written as a vehicle for Marie Tempest , who starred in the original 1927 production in London. Among later players of the central role have been Lillian Gish , Celia Johnson , Moira Lister , Diana Rigg and Kate O'Mara . The play is set in 18th-century France and depicts the complications arising from the romantic affairs of two generations of an aristocratic family. By 1926 Coward had written more than

260-425: A baritone dove, he gave us "I'll See You Again" and the other bat's-wing melodies of his youth. Nothing he does on these occasions sounds strained or arid; his tanned, leathery face is still an enthusiast's.... If it is possible to romp fastidiously, that is what Coward does. He owes little to earlier wits, such as Wilde or Labouchere . Their best things need to be delivered slowly, even lazily. Coward's emerge with

390-496: A disposition of 1 × 8 ft, 1 × 4 ft, and used the same ingenious mechanism for changing stops that Cristofori had earlier used for his oval spinet . The spinettone was a local success among the musicians of the Medici court, and Cristofori eventually built a total of four of them. Spinets are occasionally made today, sometimes from kits, and serve the same purpose they always have, of saving money and space. The pentagonal spinet

520-528: A 1968 Off-Broadway production of Private Lives at the Theatre de Lys starring Elaine Stritch , Lee Bowman and Betsy von Furstenberg , and directed by Charles Nelson Reilly . Despite this impressive cast, Coward's popularity had risen so high that the theatre poster for the production used an Al Hirschfeld caricature of Coward ( pictured above ) instead of an image of the production or its stars. The illustration captures how Coward's image had changed by

650-403: A 90-degree angle to the keyboard (that is, they are parallel to the player's gaze); and in virginals they are parallel to the keyboard, in a spinet the strings are at an angle of about 30 degrees to the keyboard, going toward the right. The case of a bentside spinet is approximately triangular. The side on the right is usually bent concavely (hence the name of the instrument), curving away from

780-852: A bust of him in the library in Teddington, near where he was born. In 2008 an exhibition devoted to Coward was mounted at the National Theatre in London. The exhibition was later hosted by the Museum of Performance & Design in San Francisco and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Beverly Hills , California. In June 2021 an exhibition celebrating Coward opened at the Guildhall Art Gallery in

910-588: A cabaret performer, performing his own songs, such as " Mad Dogs and Englishmen ", " London Pride ", and " I Went to a Marvellous Party ". Coward's plays and songs achieved new popularity in the 1960s and 1970s, and his work and style continue to influence popular culture. He did not publicly acknowledge his homosexuality, but it was discussed candidly after his death by biographers including Graham Payn , his long-time partner, and in Coward's diaries and letters, published posthumously. The former Albery Theatre (originally

1040-482: A carefully crafted image. As a suburban boy who had been taken up by the upper classes he rapidly acquired the taste for high life: "I am determined to travel through life first class." He first wore a dressing gown onstage in The Vortex and used the fashion in several of his other famous plays, including Private Lives and Present Laughter . George Walden identifies him as a modern dandy . In connection with

1170-459: A cigarette holder: "I looked like an advanced Chinese decadent in the last phases of dope." Soon after that, Coward wrote: He soon became more cautious about overdoing the flamboyance, advising Cecil Beaton to tone down his outfits: "It is important not to let the public have a loophole to lampoon you." However, Coward was happy to generate publicity from his lifestyle. In 1969 he told Time magazine, "I acted up like crazy. I did everything that

1300-562: A combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise". Coward attended a dance academy in London as a child, making his professional stage début at the age of eleven. As a teenager he was introduced into the high society in which most of his plays would be set. Coward achieved enduring success as a playwright, publishing more than 50 plays from his teens onwards. Many of his works, such as Hay Fever , Private Lives , Design for Living , Present Laughter , and Blithe Spirit , have remained in

1430-558: A complex hydraulic stage. Its 1933 film adaptation won the Academy Award for best picture. Coward's intimate-scale hits of the period included Private Lives (1930) and Design for Living (1932). In Private Lives , Coward starred alongside his most famous stage partner, Gertrude Lawrence, together with the young Laurence Olivier . It was a highlight of both Coward's and Lawrence's career, selling out in both London and New York. Coward disliked long runs, and after this he made

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1560-489: A cycle of ten short plays, presented in various permutations across three evenings. One of these plays, Still Life , was expanded into the 1945 David Lean film Brief Encounter . Tonight at 8.30 was followed by a musical, Operette (1938), from which the most famous number is "The Stately Homes of England", and a revue entitled Set to Music (1938, a Broadway version of his 1932 London revue, Words and Music ). Coward's last pre-war plays were This Happy Breed ,

1690-612: A dance academy in London, Coward's first professional engagement was in January 1911 as Prince Mussel in the children's play The Goldfish . In Present Indicative , his first volume of memoirs, Coward wrote: One day   ... a little advertisement appeared in the Daily Mirror .... It stated that a talented boy of attractive appearance was required by a Miss Lila Field to appear in her production of an all-children fairy play: The Goldfish. This seemed to dispose of all argument. I

1820-463: A document, which he throws into the fire thinking it is his letter; she then tells him she has given him her dressmaker's bill by mistake. He leaves the room in a fury. As Jacques comes downstairs, dressed for travelling and carrying a large bag, Eloise stops him, tells him to stay, and promises that she will find him work and help him win Adrienne. He goes back upstairs just as Esteban is announced. At

1950-461: A dozen plays, two of them – The Vortex and Hay Fever – were big box-office successes, and he was in demand as a playwright. He had promised Marie Tempest to write a comedy for her, and completed The Marquise while recuperating from a breakdown in his health, brought on by overwork. He told his mother, "As there are several illegitimate children in it I doubt if Lord Cromer [the official censor] will care very deeply for it". The censor licensed

2080-403: A drama about a working-class family, and Present Laughter , a comic self-caricature with an egomaniac actor as the central character. These were first performed in 1942, although they were both written in 1939. Between 1929 and 1936 Coward recorded many of his best-known songs for His Master's Voice (HMV), now reissued on CD, including the romantic " I'll See You Again " from Bitter Sweet ,

2210-462: A farce, Look After Lulu! (1959), and a tragi-comic study of old age, Waiting in the Wings (1960), both of which were successful despite "critical disdain". Coward argued that the primary purpose of a play was to entertain, and he made no attempt at modernism, which he felt was boring to the audience although fascinating to the critics. His comic novel, Pomp and Circumstance (1960), about life in

2340-403: A few mildly dirty stories, and I loved her from then onwards." In 1914, when Coward was fourteen, he became the protégé and probably the lover of Philip Streatfeild , a society painter. Streatfeild introduced him to Mrs Astley Cooper and her high society friends. Streatfeild died from tuberculosis in 1915, but Mrs Astley Cooper continued to encourage her late friend's protégé, who remained

2470-463: A frank biography once Coward was safely dead. Coward's most important relationship, which began in the mid-1940s and lasted until his death, was with the South African stage and film actor Graham Payn. Coward featured Payn in several of his London productions. Payn later co-edited with Sheridan Morley a collection of Coward's diaries, published in 1982. Coward's other relationships included

2600-771: A frequent guest at her estate, Hambleton Hall in Rutland. Coward continued to perform during most of the First World War, appearing at the Prince of Wales Theatre in 1916 in The Happy Family and on tour with Amy Brandon Thomas 's company in Charley's Aunt . In 1917, he appeared in The Saving Grace , a comedy produced by Hawtrey. Coward recalled in his memoirs, "My part was reasonably large and I

2730-506: A great demand for new Coward plays. In 1925 he premiered Fallen Angels , a three-act comedy that amused and shocked audiences with the spectacle of two middle-aged women slowly getting drunk while awaiting the arrival of their mutual lover. Hay Fever , the first of Coward's plays to gain an enduring place in the mainstream theatrical repertoire, also appeared in 1925. It is a comedy about four egocentric members of an artistic family who casually invite acquaintances to their country house for

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2860-575: A hit 1963 revival of Private Lives in London and then New York. Invited to direct Hay Fever with Edith Evans at the National Theatre , he wrote in 1964, "I am thrilled and flattered and frankly a little flabbergasted that the National Theatre should have had the curious perceptiveness to choose a very early play of mine and to give it a cast that could play the Albanian telephone directory." Other examples of "Dad's Renaissance" included

2990-482: A letter he wrote to her at the time of their parting, in which he said that, if ever she felt weary and alone, he would always be waiting for her. He replies that his wife changed him completely: he has repented of his loose living and now has faith and peace and nobility of purpose. Eloise walks out. He calls after her, but she has gone. He unlocks a cabinet and takes out a box containing a packet of Eloise's letters, trinkets and other mementos. He smashes it open and flings

3120-585: A new kind of virginals in 1688, he called it the "spinetta ovale", " oval spinet ". In earlier times when English spelling was less standardized, "spinet" was sometimes spelled "spinnet" or "spinnit". "Spinet" is standard today. Spinet derives from the Italian spinetta , which in 17th-century Italian was a word used generally for all quilled instruments, especially what in Elizabethan / Jacobean English were called virginals . The specific Italian word for

3250-585: A night club, were financial failures. Further blows in this period were the deaths of Coward's friends Charles Cochran and Gertrude Lawrence, in 1951 and 1952 respectively. Despite his disappointments, Coward maintained a high public profile; his performance as King Magnus in Shaw's The Apple Cart for the Coronation season of 1953, co-starring Margaret Leighton , received much coverage in the press, and his cabaret act, honed during his wartime tours entertaining

3380-402: A one-act satire, The Better Half , about a man's relationship with two women. It had a short run at The Little Theatre, London, in 1922. The critic St John Ervine wrote of the piece, "When Mr Coward has learned that tea-table chitter-chatter had better remain the prerogative of women he will write more interesting plays than he now seems likely to write." The play was thought to be lost until

3510-419: A playwright with The Vortex . The story is about a nymphomaniac socialite and her cocaine-addicted son (played by Coward). Some saw the drugs as a mask for homosexuality; Kenneth Tynan later described it as "a jeremiad against narcotics with dialogue that sounds today not so much stilted as high-heeled". The Vortex was considered shocking in its day for its depiction of sexual vanity and drug abuse among

3640-481: A playwright with The Young Idea . The play opened in London in 1923, after a provincial tour, with Coward in one of the leading roles. The reviews were good: "Mr Noël Coward calls his brilliant little farce a 'comedy of youth', and so it is. And youth pervaded the Savoy last night, applauding everything so boisterously that you felt, not without exhilaration, that you were in the midst of a 'rag'." One critic, who noted

3770-729: A rule of starring in a play for no more than three months at any venue. Design for Living , written for Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne , was so risqué, with its theme of bisexuality and a ménage à trois , that Coward premiered it in New York, knowing that it would not survive the censor in London. In 1933 Coward wrote, directed and co-starred with the French singer Yvonne Printemps in both London and New York productions of an operetta, Conversation Piece (1933). He next wrote, directed and co-starred with Lawrence in Tonight at 8.30 (1936),

3900-563: A sense of comedy, and if he can overcome a tendency to smartness, he will probably produce a good play one of these days." The Times , on the other hand, was enthusiastic: "It is a remarkable piece of work from so young a head – spontaneous, light, and always 'brainy'." The play ran for a month (and was Coward's first play seen in America), after which Coward returned to acting in works by other writers, starring as Ralph in The Knight of

4030-401: A smaller case. The disadvantage of the paired design is that it generally limits the spinet to a single choir of strings, at eight-foot pitch , although a double-strung spinet by John Player is known. In a full-size harpsichord, the registers that guide the jacks can be shifted slightly to one side, permitting the player to control whether or not that particular set of strings is sounded. This

The Marquise - Misplaced Pages Continue

4160-482: A successful living as a singer. Her reason for leaving Esteban was to prevent his family from disinheriting him and ruining his career; she left Raoul because he never once suggested marriage to her. Esteban chivalrously offers her his hand; Eloise makes no immediate reply, and Raoul suddenly exclaims that he loves her. He walks out to the terrace. Esteban is plainly relieved that her choice will fall on Raoul. She kisses him good night, and he leaves them. Eloise sits down at

4290-447: A traitor and a hypocrite, and slaps his face. This leads to a duel; Raoul sends Hubert to fetch a rapier, the furniture is pushed back, and Esteban draws his sword. Eloise sits at the side on a spinet , eating an orange and urging the combatants on ("Really, considering your joint ages, you're doing magnificently!"). When she decides they have fought enough, she throws an embroidered cloth over their blades and commands them to stop. Esteban

4420-572: A tropical British colony, met with more critical success. Coward's final stage success came with Suite in Three Keys (1966), a trilogy set in a hotel penthouse suite. He wrote it as his swan song as a stage actor: "I would like to act once more before I fold my bedraggled wings." The trilogy gained glowing reviews and did good box office business in the UK. In one of the three plays, A Song at Twilight , Coward abandoned his customary reticence on

4550-532: A typescript was found in 2007 in the archive of the Lord Chamberlain's Office , the official censor of stage plays in the UK until 1968. In 1921, Coward made his first trip to America, hoping to interest producers there in his plays. Although he had little luck, he found the Broadway theatre stimulating. He absorbed its smartness and pace into his own work, which brought him his first real success as

4680-481: A virginals is spinetta a tabola . Likewise, the French derivation from spinetta , épinette , is specifically what the virginals is called in French, although the word is also used for any other small quilled instrument, whether a small harpsichord or a clavichord . In German, Spinett and Querflügel are used. A dumb spinet is a manichord or " clavichord or clarichord ", according to the 1913 edition of Webster's Dictionary . The spinet piano, manufactured from

4810-405: A weaker sound. For these reasons, the spinet was normally only a domestic instrument, purchased to save money and conserve domestic space. Harpsichord historian Frank Hubbard wrote in 1967, "the earliest [bentside] spinet known to me was made by Hieronymus de Zentis in 1631. It is quite possible that Zentis was the inventor of the type so widely copied in other countries." He further notes that

4940-483: A wheel and she is obliged to ask hospitality for the night. Raoul refuses it, saying there is no room, but his daughter (encouraged by Hubert, who has recognised the Marquise) insists that she shall stay. The next morning Miguel calls, in response to a note from Adrienne, who is distraught because her father is dismissing Jacques. Miguel consoles her, promising to seek his father's help, and goes to find Esteban. Jacques

5070-481: Is a political comedy set in a British colony; Quadrille (1952) is a drama about Victorian love and elopement; and Nude with Violin (1956, starring John Gielgud in London and Coward in New York) is a satire on modern art and critical pretension. A revue, Sigh No More (1945), was a moderate success, but two musicals, Pacific 1860 (1946), a lavish South Seas romance, and Ace of Clubs (1950), set in

5200-414: Is a pretence – he does not love her, or he would not force her to marry against her will. So adds that he can send her to a convent but she will not marry Miguel. As she sobs the front door bell clangs, and the servant Hubert ushers in "Madame la Marquise de Kestournel". Eloise, followed by her maid Alice, stands in the doorway. She greets Raoul formally as though a stranger, explaining that her coach has lost

5330-491: Is dejected, believing it his duty to renounce Adrienne; she begs him not to go away immediately. As they go out to the terrace, Eloise enters. She exchanges a few words with Hubert, who is pleased to see her back, and tells her that both the Count and his daughter are in need of cheering up. Father Clement brings a message from Raoul, regretting that a headache will prevent him from saying goodbye to her before she leaves; she ignores

The Marquise - Misplaced Pages Continue

5460-482: Is impossible in a spinet, due to the alternating orientation of the jacks. For an exception to this point, see "spinettone", below. The angling of the strings also had consequences for tone quality: generally, it was not possible to make the plucking points as close to the nut as in a regular harpsichord. Thus spinets normally had a slightly different tone quality, with fewer higher harmonics . Spinets also had smaller soundboards than regular harpsichords, and normally had

5590-448: Is still angry, but she tells him that if he slaps Raoul's face it will be a quid pro quo and honour will be satisfied. He does so, lightly, and bursts out laughing. The two men embrace. Having reconciled them, Eloise reveals that she has never been married – they were the only two men in her life, and for the past sixteen years she has lived an entirely virtuous existence – "in this depraved age it's rather humiliating to admit it" – earning

5720-466: Is that the strings are arranged in pairs. The gap between the two strings of a pair is about four millimetres, and the wider gap between pairs is about ten. The jacks (which pluck the strings) are arranged in pairs as well, placed in the wider gap. They face in opposite directions, plucking the adjacent string on either side of the wider gap. The fact that half of the gaps are four millimetres instead of ten makes it possible to crowd more strings together into

5850-408: Is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the bentside spinet , described in this section. For other uses, see below. The bentside spinet shares most of its characteristics with the full-size instrument, including action , soundboard , and case construction. What primarily distinguishes the spinet is the angle of its strings: whereas in a full-size harpsichord, the strings are at

5980-400: The 1943 Academy Awards ceremony. Coward played a naval captain, basing the character on his friend Lord Louis Mountbatten . Lean went on to direct and adapt film versions of three Coward plays. Coward's most enduring work from the war years was the hugely successful black comedy Blithe Spirit (1941), about a novelist who researches the occult and hires a medium. A séance brings back

6110-506: The City of London . Coward was homosexual but, following the convention of his times, this was never publicly mentioned. The critic Kenneth Tynan's description in 1953 was close to an acknowledgment of Coward's sexuality: "Forty years ago he was Slightly in Peter Pan , and you might say that he has been wholly in Peter Pan ever since. No private considerations have been allowed to deflect

6240-706: The D. W. Griffith film Hearts of the World in an uncredited role. He began writing plays, collaborating on the first two ( Ida Collaborates (1917) and Women and Whisky (1918)) with his friend Esmé Wynne. His first solo effort as a playwright was The Rat Trap (1918) which was eventually produced at the Everyman Theatre , Hampstead , in October 1926. During these years, he met Lorn McNaughtan, who became his private secretary and served in that capacity for more than forty years, until her death. In 1920, at

6370-477: The Great Depression , writing a succession of popular hits. They ranged from large-scale spectaculars to intimate comedies. Examples of the former were the operetta Bitter Sweet (1929), about a woman who elopes with her music teacher, and the historical extravaganza Cavalcade (1931) at Drury Lane , about thirty years in the lives of two families, which required a huge cast, gargantuan sets and

6500-580: The OMs , demonstrably the greatest living English playwright." Time wrote that "in the 60s... his best work, with its inspired inconsequentiality, seemed to exert not only a period charm but charm, period." By the end of the 1960s, Coward developed arteriosclerosis and, during the run of Suite in Three Keys , struggled with bouts of memory loss. This also affected his work in The Italian Job , and he retired from acting immediately afterwards. Coward

6630-563: The Savoy Hotel . During one air raid on the area around the Savoy he joined Carroll Gibbons and Judy Campbell in impromptu cabaret to distract the captive guests from their fears. Another of Coward's wartime projects, as writer, star, composer and co-director (alongside David Lean), was the naval film drama In Which We Serve . The film was popular on both sides of the Atlantic, and he was awarded an honorary certificate of merit at

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6760-589: The diæresis (" I didn't put the dots over the 'e' in Noël. The language did. Otherwise it's not Noël but Nool!"). The press and many book publishers failed to follow suit, and his name was printed as 'Noel' in The Times , The Observer and other contemporary newspapers and books. "Why", asked Coward, "am I always expected to wear a dressing-gown, smoke cigarettes in a long holder and say 'Darling, how wonderful'?" The answer lay in Coward's assiduous cultivation of

6890-434: The 1930s until recent times, was the culmination of a trend among manufacturers to make pianos smaller and cheaper. It served the purpose of making pianos available for a low price, for owners who had little space for a piano. Many spinet pianos still exist today, left over from their period of manufacture. The defining characteristic of the spinet was its drop action (sometimes called indirect blow action ). In this device,

7020-636: The 1946 Playbox production in Pasadena, California . A British touring production in 2004 starred Kate O'Mara , Michael Jayston and Denis Lill . The BBC broadcast the play in December 1969 as part of the celebrations of Coward's seventieth birthday. Celia Johnson played Eloise, with Richard Vernon as Raoul and Philip Latham as Esteban. The BBC transmitted a radio adaptation the following year, with Moira Lister as Eloise, Peter Pratt as Raoul and Richard Hurndall as Esteban. A television adaptation

7150-488: The 1960s: he was no longer seen as the smooth 1930s sophisticate, but as the doyen of the theatre. As The New Statesman wrote in 1964, "Who would have thought the landmarks of the Sixties would include the emergence of Noël Coward as the grand old man of British drama? There he was one morning, flipping verbal tiddlywinks with reporters about "Dad's Renaissance"; the next he was   ... beside Forster , T. S. Eliot and

7280-420: The 19th century. After the 1930s, many people still continued to purchase spinets; a 1947 study showed that about 50 percent of all pianos sold during that production year were pianos strung vertically of 37 inches (0.94 m) in height or less. The spinet enjoyed decades of popularity after the 1930s, but production was halted in the early 1990s. The spinet organ , a product of the mid-20th century, served

7410-575: The Burning Pestle in Birmingham and then London. He did not enjoy the role, finding Francis Beaumont and his sometime collaborator John Fletcher "two of the dullest Elizabethan writers ever known ... I had a very, very long part, but I was very, very bad at it". Nevertheless, The Manchester Guardian thought that Coward got the best out of the role, and The Times called the play "the jolliest thing in London". Coward completed

7540-502: The Château de Vriaac, near Paris, in the year 1735. Count Raoul de Vriaac, once something of a rake, but now a solemn and reformed character, is giving a dinner to celebrate the betrothal of his daughter Adrienne to Miguel, the son of Esteban, Duke of Santaguano. Esteban was Raoul's boon companion in the days of their youthful indiscretions. Also present are Raoul's young secretary, Jacques Rijar, and confessor, Father Clement. Raoul toasts

7670-545: The Marquise de Kestournel steps in, exquisitely dressed for travelling. She is the woman with whom he had his one genuine love affair in his youth, and he had believed her to be dead. After a brief exchange about minor matters, she asks, "Where is my child?" He replies that her child is dead – "as far as you are concerned." Adrienne, he says, believes that his wife was her mother. He asks Eloise why she has sprung this surprise on him. Saying she has come back for good, she shows him

7800-407: The National Theatre's 2008 exhibition, The Independent commented, "His famous silk, polka-dot dressing gown and elegant cigarette holder both seem to belong to another era. But 2008 is proving to be the year that Britain falls in love with Noël Coward all over again." As soon as he achieved success he began polishing the Coward image: an early press photograph showed him sitting up in bed holding

7930-655: The New Theatre) in London was renamed the Noël Coward Theatre in his honour in 2006. Coward was born in 1899 in Teddington , Middlesex , a south-western suburb of London. His parents were Arthur Sabin Coward (1856–1937), a piano salesman, and Violet Agnes Coward (1863–1954), daughter of Henry Gordon Veitch, a captain and surveyor in the Royal Navy . Noël Coward was the second of their three sons,

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8060-765: The Queen Mother replied, "I came because he was my friend." The Noël Coward Theatre in St Martin's Lane , originally opened in 1903 as the New Theatre and later called the Albery, was renamed in his honour after extensive refurbishment, re-opening on 1 June 2006. A statue of Coward by Angela Conner was unveiled by the Queen Mother in the foyer of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1998. There are also sculptures of Coward displayed in New York and Jamaica, and

8190-819: The Second World War. It is a Grade II listed building . In the 1950s, Coward left the UK for tax reasons, receiving harsh criticism in the press. He first settled in Bermuda but later bought houses in Jamaica and Switzerland ( Chalet Covar in the village of Les Avants , near Montreux ), which remained his homes for the rest of his life. His expatriate neighbours and friends included Joan Sutherland , David Niven , Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor , and Julie Andrews and Blake Edwards in Switzerland and Ian Fleming and his wife Ann in Jamaica. Coward

8320-811: The West End: The Vortex , Fallen Angels , Hay Fever and On with the Dance . Coward was turning out numerous plays and acting in his own works and others'. Soon his frantic pace caught up with him while starring in The Constant Nymph . He collapsed and was ordered to rest for a month; he ignored the doctors and sailed for the US to start rehearsals for his play This Was a Man . In New York he collapsed again, and had to take an extended rest, recuperating in Hawaii. Other Coward works produced in

8450-488: The Winter "Musette". The Musette, along with its spinet cousins, were initially a success, being the only kind of piano that many people could afford in the depths of the Great Depression . (According to Loesser, the price could be less than $ 300, "about twenty-five percent lower than ... a small upright of 1924.") Loesser notes that the spinet was not entirely new, as very small pianos had been manufactured at various times in

8580-489: The World in 80 Days (1956), Our Man in Havana (1959), Bunny Lake Is Missing (1965), Boom! (1968) and The Italian Job (1969). Stage and film opportunities he turned down in the 1950s included an invitation to compose a musical version of Pygmalion (two years before My Fair Lady was written), and offers of the roles of the king in the original stage production of The King and I , and Colonel Nicholson in

8710-627: The age of 20, Coward starred in his own play, the light comedy I'll Leave It to You . After a three-week run in Manchester it opened in London at the New Theatre (renamed the Noël Coward Theatre in 2006), his first full-length play in the West End. Neville Cardus 's praise in The Manchester Guardian was grudging. Notices for the London production were mixed, but encouraging. The Observer commented, "Mr Coward... has

8840-416: The best thing about the play was that "Miss Tempest is given such ample opportunities to exploit her delectable personality". The Times thought the third act weak, finding that after the climax of the second act, with the marriage at pistol-point, the duel and reconciliations of Act III did not engage the attention. Punch also praised the first two acts but found the last act weak. Much of this criticism

8970-828: The children's play Where the Rainbow Ends . Coward played in the piece in 1911 and 1912 at the Garrick Theatre in London's West End . In 1912 Coward also appeared at the Savoy Theatre in An Autumn Idyll (as a dancer in the ballet) and at the London Coliseum in A Little Fowl Play , by Harold Owen, in which Hawtrey starred. Italia Conti engaged Coward to appear at the Liverpool Repertory Theatre in 1913, and in

9100-664: The comic " Mad Dogs and Englishmen " from Words and Music , and "Mrs Worthington". With the outbreak of the Second World War Coward abandoned the theatre and sought official war work. After running the British propaganda office in Paris, where he concluded that "if the policy of His Majesty's Government is to bore the Germans to death I don't think we have time", he worked on behalf of British intelligence. His task

9230-501: The contents into the fire. Roused by the noise, Adrienne comes down. Her father sharply orders her to go back to bed; she refuses, saying firmly that she wants to talk to him: she will not marry Miguel because she loves Jacques Rijar. Having declared that Jacques will be dismissed, the Count appeals to her in the name of her "dear dead mother". Adrienne says furiously that her mother cared nothing for either of them. "She only loved herself and God and Father Clement". She adds that Raoul's life

9360-569: The curtain calls and spitting at Coward as he left the theatre. Coward later said of this flop, "My first instinct was to leave England immediately, but this seemed too craven a move, and also too gratifying to my enemies, whose numbers had by then swollen in our minds to practically the entire population of the British Isles." By 1929 Coward was one of the world's highest-earning writers, with an annual income of £50,000, more than £3 million in terms of 2020 values. Coward thrived during

9490-557: The drive of his career; like Gielgud and Rattigan , like the late Ivor Novello, he is a congenital bachelor." Coward firmly believed his private business was not for public discussion, considering " any sexual activities when over-advertised" to be tasteless. Even in the 1960s, Coward refused to acknowledge his sexual orientation publicly, wryly observing, "There are still a few old ladies in Worthing who don't know." Despite this reticence, he encouraged his secretary Cole Lesley to write

9620-517: The duke's death, "I suddenly find that I loved him more than I knew." Coward maintained close friendships with many women, including the actress and author Esmé Wynne-Tyson, his first collaborator and constant correspondent; Gladys Calthrop , who designed sets and costumes for many of his works; his secretary and close confidante Lorn Loraine; the actresses Gertrude Lawrence, Joyce Carey and Judy Campbell; and "his loyal and lifelong amitié amoureuse ", Marlene Dietrich . In his profession, Coward

9750-493: The eldest of whom had died in 1898 at the age of six. Coward's father lacked ambition and industry, and family finances were often poor. Coward was bitten by the performing bug early and appeared in amateur concerts by the age of seven. He attended the Chapel Royal Choir School as a young child. He had little formal schooling but was a voracious reader. Encouraged by his ambitious mother, who sent him to

9880-768: The film The Bridge on the River Kwai . Invited to play the title role in the 1962 film Dr. No , he replied, "No, no, no, a thousand times, no." In the same year, he turned down the role of Humbert Humbert in Lolita , saying, "At my time of life the film story would be logical if the 12-year-old heroine was a sweet little old lady." In the mid-1960s and early 1970s successful productions of his 1920s and 1930s plays, and new revues celebrating his music, including Oh, Coward! on Broadway and Cowardy Custard in London, revived Coward's popularity and critical reputation. He dubbed this comeback "Dad's Renaissance". It began with

10010-649: The ghost of his first wife, causing havoc for the novelist and his second wife. With 1,997 consecutive performances, it broke box-office records for the run of a West End comedy, and was also produced on Broadway, where its original run was 650 performances. The play was adapted into a 1945 film , directed by Lean. Coward toured during 1942 in Blithe Spirit , in rotation with his comedy Present Laughter and his working-class drama This Happy Breed . In his Middle East Diary Coward made several statements that offended many Americans. In particular, he commented that he

10140-481: The hint. Adrienne re-enters. Eloise has taken an immediate liking to her, and a candid exchange follows in which Adrienne tells Eloise about her difficulties. She slips off as her father appears. He is in a bad temper and bids Eloise go at once, repeating that she is sinful and shall not enter his life again; she can go back to her own house. She replies that her house is sold, so sure was she that he would welcome her with open arms, and honour his old promise. She hands him

10270-503: The home front than by intelligence work: "Go and sing to them when the guns are firing – that's your job!" Coward, though disappointed, followed this advice. He toured, acted and sang indefatigably in Europe, Africa, Asia and America. He wrote and recorded war-themed popular songs, including " London Pride " and " Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Germans ". His London home was wrecked by German bombs in 1941, and he took up temporary residence at

10400-564: The influence of Bernard Shaw on Coward's writing, thought more highly of the play than of Coward's newly found fans: "I was unfortunately wedged in the centre of a group of his more exuberant friends who greeted each of his sallies with 'That's a Noëlism!'" The play ran in London from 1 February to 24 March 1923, after which Coward turned to revue , co-writing and performing in André Charlot 's London Calling! In 1924, Coward achieved his first great critical and financial success as

10530-433: The keys did not engage the action directly; rather they pulled upward on rods called "stickers", which in turn pulled upward on levers located below the level of the keyboard, which in turn engaged the action . The stickers were sufficiently long that the hammer heads (the highest part of the action) ended up at roughly the same vertical level as the keyboard. Thanks to the drop action, spinet pianos could be made very small;

10660-619: The keys have to be removed from the piano before the action can be lifted out. According to piano historian Arthur Loesser (1954), the first spinet piano was offered to the public in May 1935, by an American manufacturer Loesser does not identify. However, according to the Blue Book of Pianos, this manufacturer was Winter and Company (which eventually became part of the Aeolian-American Corporation ) who sold this piano as

10790-644: The king irresponsible, telling Churchill, "England doesn't wish for a Queen Cutie." Coward disliked propaganda in plays: Nevertheless, his own views sometimes surfaced in his plays: both Cavalcade and This Happy Breed are, in the words of the playwright David Edgar , "overtly Conservative political plays written in the Brechtian epic manner." In religion, Coward was agnostic. He wrote of his views, "Do I believe in God? I can't say No and I can't say Yes, To me it's anybody's guess." Coward spelled his first name with

10920-453: The library. Adrienne is not in high spirits: she tells Miguel that he does not really love her. He admits it: he is in love with a dancer in Paris. She confides that she is in love with her father's secretary. Miguel promises to help her, and when Jacques comes in he leaves them together. They embrace passionately but briefly before Esteban comes back with Raoul, to take his leave. When Adrienne has gone to bed, Raoul reproves Jacques for leaving

11050-707: The locked door. Later the same day Raoul is seated alone at supper. He sends for Hubert, calls for cognac, and drinks copiously. When Esteban comes to take Eloise to supper, he is surprised to find Raoul still in residence, and taken aback when his staid friend professes a longing for Paris, the city of sin: "Vivid, scarlet sin – it warms one up, you know". Hubert tells Esteban that the Marquise and Father Clement have both left, and Adrienne has married Jacques and gone to Paris with him. Not entirely sober, Raoul addresses his wife's portrait, saying that he forgives her for being "a determined and unmitigated bore". He drinks black coffee to clear his head, and he confirms Hubert's account of

11180-537: The mid-to-late 1920s included the plays Easy Virtue (1926), a drama about a divorcée's clash with her snobbish in-laws; The Queen Was in the Parlour , a Ruritanian romance ; This Was a Man (1926), a comedy about adulterous aristocrats; The Marquise (1927), an eighteenth-century costume drama; Home Chat (1927), a comedy about a married woman's fidelity; and the revues On with the Dance (1925) and This Year of Grace (1928). None of these shows has entered

11310-412: The morning's events. Esteban and Raoul compare notes and discover that Eloise has had an affair, and a child, with each. The two men drink to her damnation. As they do so, she quietly enters from the terrace, where she has been listening. Both men accuse her of having deceived and betrayed them. She responds that she is expecting one or the other to marry her. Raoul loses his temper, accuses Esteban of being

11440-709: The north coast of the island. A memorial service was held in St Martin-in-the-Fields in London on 29 May 1973, for which the Poet Laureate , John Betjeman , wrote and delivered a poem in Coward's honour, John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier read verse, and Yehudi Menuhin played Bach . On 28 March 1984 a memorial stone was unveiled by the Queen Mother in Poets' Corner , Westminster Abbey . Thanked by Coward's partner, Graham Payn , for attending,

11570-497: The numbers from his Las Vegas act. It was followed by productions of Blithe Spirit in which he starred with Claudette Colbert , Lauren Bacall and Mildred Natwick and This Happy Breed with Edna Best and Roger Moore . Despite excellent reviews, the audience viewing figures were moderate. During the 1950s and 1960s Coward continued to write musicals and plays. After the Ball , his 1953 adaptation of Lady Windermere's Fan ,

11700-605: The other, and that Miguel and Adrienne are half-brother and -sister. Unlike Raoul, Esteban is warmly disposed to his former lover, and they vow to be good friends. Having recovered his temper, Raoul comes to say that he is taking Adrienne away to Paris; meanwhile, his house is at the service of Madame la Marquise. Esteban invites Eloise to have supper with him, and leaves. After a last appeal to Raoul not to make Adrienne marry Miguel, Eloise takes matters into her own hands. She sends for Father Clement, and at pistol point forces him to marry Adrienne to Jacques; Raoul furiously bangs in vain at

11830-535: The outbreak of the Second World War, Coward volunteered for war work, running the British propaganda office in Paris. He also worked with the Secret Service, seeking to use his influence to persuade the American public and government to help Britain. Coward won an Academy Honorary Award in 1943 for his naval film drama In Which We Serve and was knighted in 1970. In the 1950s he achieved fresh success as

11960-419: The piece was the love scene between Adrienne and Jacques: "Mr Coward still cannot write an effective love scene; his imagination is defeated when he cannot be flippant about the mating of true lovers. In time, no doubt, his innate sincerity will enable him to conquer such scenes, but that time is not yet, and I am obliged frankly to say that what should have been a fragrant interlude was tiresomely banal". He found

12090-468: The play, and it was put into rehearsal. Tempest wrote to Coward: "Your writing of the play is, to me, amazing. I cannot tell you how much I love it all!!" Tempest co-starred with her husband, W. Graham Brown , who also directed. The play opened at the Criterion Theatre , London, on 16 February 1927 and ran for 129 performances, until 11 June. The action takes place in the main living-room of

12220-417: The player toward the right rear corner. The longest side is adjacent to and parallel with the bass strings, going from the right rear corner to a location on the player's left. The front side of the spinet contains the keyboard. Typically, there are very short sides at the right rear and on the left, connecting the bentside to the long side and the long side to the front. The other major aspect of spinet design

12350-459: The playwright Keith Winter, actors Louis Hayward and Alan Webb , his manager Jack Wilson and the composer Ned Rorem , who published details of their relationship in his diaries. Coward had a 19-year friendship with Prince George, Duke of Kent , but biographers differ on whether it was platonic. Payn believed that it was, although Coward reportedly admitted to the historian Michael Thornton that there had been "a little dalliance". Coward said, on

12480-497: The public view of Coward's flamboyant lifestyle, Churchill used as his reason for withholding the honour Coward's £200 fine for contravening currency regulations in 1941. Had the Germans invaded Britain, Coward was scheduled to be arrested and killed, as he was in The Black Book along with other figures such as Virginia Woolf , Paul Robeson , Bertrand Russell , C. P. Snow and H. G. Wells . When this came to light after

12610-402: The regular repertoire, but the last introduced one of Coward's best-known songs, "A Room with a View". His biggest failure in this period was the play Sirocco (1927), which concerns free love among the wealthy. It starred Ivor Novello , of whom Coward said, "the two most beautiful things in the world are Ivor's profile and my mind". Theatregoers hated the play, showing violent disapproval at

12740-461: The regular theatre repertoire. He composed hundreds of songs, in addition to well over a dozen musical theatre works (including the operetta Bitter Sweet and comic revues ), screenplays, poetry, several volumes of short stories, the novel Pomp and Circumstance , and a three-volume autobiography. Coward's stage and film acting and directing career spanned six decades, during which he starred in many of his own works, as well as those of others. At

12870-441: The rest of the play "delicious and done with dexterity and delicacy". In The Manchester Guardian , Ivor Brown thought the play a "dried and brittle little piece", made successful chiefly by Marie Tempest's "genius". The Daily Telegraph found the play "flaming and theatrical and deft in the extreme … written with a sense of style". The Daily Mail thought "Mr Noel Coward has done far, far better things than this", and thought

13000-709: The same year he was cast as the Lost Boy Slightly in Peter Pan . He reappeared in Peter Pan the following year, and in 1915 he was again in Where the Rainbow Ends . He worked with other child actors in this period, including Hermione Gingold (whose mother threatened to turn "that naughty boy" out); Fabia Drake ; Esmé Wynne , with whom he collaborated on his earliest plays; Alfred Willmore, later known as Micheál Mac Liammóir ; and Gertrude Lawrence who, Coward wrote in his memoirs, "gave me an orange and told me

13130-419: The sight of each other, Esteban and Eloise are astonished. They fall into each other's arms, and she asks him for news of her child, François. Esteban explains that the boy was re-named Miguel, and realising that this is Adrienne's fiancé, Eloise goes into gales of hysterical laughter. It becomes clear (although not yet to Esteban) that she had had affairs with Esteban and later Raoul with neither man knowing about

13260-441: The spinet and begins to play, as Raoul comes in again. He tells her, "I mean what I said. I do love you", and she replies that it has "been obvious since the first moment I came into the house". He rests his head on her shoulder as the curtain falls. The theatre critic of The Morning Post called the play "a very amusing and well-constructed piece … the first of Mr. Coward's plays to have a good first act". His only complaint about

13390-485: The spinet in France was sometimes called the épinette à l'italienne , supporting an Italian origin. In England, builders included John Player, Thomas Barton, Charles Haward, Stephen Keene, Cawton Aston , and Thomas Hitchcock. The spinet was later developed into the spinettone ("big spinet") by Bartolomeo Cristofori (1655–1731), the inventor of the piano . The spinettone incorporated multiple choirs of strings, with

13520-413: The spinet resulted in a narrow range of harmonics and thus in poor tone quality. The spinet was also the bane of piano technicians. Concerning the difficulty of servicing them, Fine writes Spinets ... are very difficult to service because even the smallest repair requiring removal of the action becomes a major ordeal. Each of the connecting stickers has to be disconnected and tied up to the action and all

13650-411: The staccato, blind impulsiveness of a machine-gun. In 1955 Coward's cabaret act at Las Vegas, recorded live for the gramophone and released as Noël Coward at Las Vegas , was so successful that CBS engaged him to write and direct a series of three 90-minute television specials for the 1955–56 season. The first of these, Together With Music , paired Coward with Mary Martin , featuring him in many of

13780-533: The subject and played an explicitly homosexual character. The daring piece earned Coward new critical praise. He intended to star in the trilogy on Broadway but was too ill to travel. Only two of the Suite in Three Keys plays were performed in New York, with the title changed to Noël Coward in Two Keys , starring Hume Cronyn . Coward won new popularity in several notable films later in his career, such as Around

13910-455: The table during the Duke's speech. Jacques answers his employer recklessly, accusing him of being "Afraid – of youth – afraid of life – afraid of suffering – afraid of happiness". Raoul angrily replies that Jacques has taken leave of his senses, and tells him to go to bed. Raoul remains, gazing at a portrait of his late wife, until he is startled by a tapping at the terrace window. He opens it, and

14040-415: The terrace, and Father Clement says good night, leaving the two old friends together. Under the influence of his late wife and her confessor, Raoul has settled down into respectable dullness, and he is uncomfortable when Esteban reminisces about their misspent youth. Raoul admits to one real love-affair, about which Esteban never knew, but before he can say more Miguel and Adrienne return. The older men go into

14170-412: The top of a spinet rose only a few inches above the level of the keyboard itself. However, according to piano author Larry Fine , the cost in quality was considerable. The stickers were "often noisy and troublesome". Moreover, to make room for them, the keys had to be made shorter, resulting in "very poor leverage" and thus a poor sense of touch and control for the player. Lastly, the very short strings of

14300-635: The troops, was a supreme success, first in London at the Café de Paris , and later in Las Vegas . The theatre critic Kenneth Tynan wrote: To see him whole, public and private personalities conjoined, you must see him in cabaret ... he padded down the celebrated stairs   ... halted before the microphone on black-suede-clad feet, and, upraising both hands in a gesture of benediction, set about demonstrating how these things should be done. Baring his teeth as if unveiling some grotesque monument, and cooing like

14430-598: The upper classes. Its notoriety and fiery performances attracted large audiences, justifying a move from a small suburban theatre to a larger one in the West End. Coward, still having trouble finding producers, raised the money to produce the play himself. During the run of The Vortex , Coward met Jack Wilson , an American stockbroker (later a director and producer), who became his business manager and lover. At first Wilson managed Coward's business affairs well, but later abused his position to embezzle from his employer. The success of The Vortex in both London and America caused

14560-474: The war, Coward wrote an alternative reality play, Peace in Our Time , depicting an England occupied by Nazi Germany . Coward's new plays after the war were moderately successful but failed to match the popularity of his pre-war hits. Relative Values (1951) addresses the culture clash between an aristocratic English family and a Hollywood actress with matrimonial ambitions; South Sea Bubble (1951)

14690-451: The war, Coward wrote: "If anyone had told me at that time I was high up on the Nazi blacklist, I should have laughed ... I remember Rebecca West , who was one of the many who shared the honour with me, sent me a telegram which read: 'My dear – the people we should have been seen dead with'." Churchill's view was that Coward would do more for the war effort by entertaining the troops and

14820-507: The weekend and bemuse and enrage each other's guests. Some writers have seen elements of Coward's old mentor, Mrs Astley Cooper, and her set in the characters of the family. By the 1970s the play was recognised as a classic, described in The Times as a "dazzling achievement; like The Importance of Being Earnest , it is pure comedy with no mission but to delight, and it depends purely on the interplay of characters, not on elaborate comic machinery." By June 1925 Coward had four shows running in

14950-403: The world is relatively small. On the other hand, my sense of my own importance to myself is tremendous." When a Time interviewer apologised, "I hope you haven't been bored having to go through all these interviews for your [70th] birthday, having to answer the same old questions about yourself", Coward rejoined, "Not at all. I'm fascinated by the subject." Spinet When the term spinet

15080-400: The young couple, urging them to live with "clarity of purpose and humility of spirit". Esteban thinks his old friend has become overserious, and his own advice to the couple is, "Enjoy yourselves as much as possible; it will pass the time pleasantly and lead you into old age with a few gay memories to cheer you". During Esteban's speech Jacques abruptly leaves the room. The young people go out on

15210-603: Was knighted in 1970, and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature . He received a Tony Award for lifetime achievement in 1970. In 1972, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters degree by the University of Sussex . At the age of 73, Coward died at his home, Firefly Estate , in Jamaica on 26 March 1973 of heart failure and was buried three days later on the brow of Firefly Hill, overlooking

15340-535: Was "less impressed by some of the mournful little Brooklyn boys lying there in tears amid the alien corn with nothing worse than a bullet wound in the leg or a fractured arm". After protests from both The New York Times and The Washington Post , the Foreign Office urged Coward not to visit the United States in January 1945. He did not return to America again during the war. In the aftermath of

15470-413: Was a talented boy, God knows, and, when washed and smarmed down a bit, passably attractive. There appeared to be no earthly reason why Miss Lila Field shouldn't jump at me, and we both believed that she would be a fool indeed to miss such a magnificent opportunity. The leading actor-manager Charles Hawtrey , whom the young Coward idolised and from whom he learned a great deal about the theatre, cast him in

15600-523: Was a witness at the Flemings' wedding, but his diaries record his exasperation with their constant bickering. Coward's political views were conservative, but not unswervingly so: he despised the government of Neville Chamberlain for its policy of appeasing Nazi Germany, and he differed sharply with Winston Churchill over the abdication crisis of 1936. Whereas Churchill supported Edward VIII 's wish to marry "his cutie", Wallis Simpson , Coward thought

15730-402: Was broadcast in 1980, with Diana Rigg as Eloise, Richard Johnson as Raoul, James Villiers as Esteban and Daniel Chatto as Miguel. No%C3%ABl Coward Sir Noël Peirce Coward (16 December 1899 – 26 March 1973) was an English playwright, composer, director, actor, and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style,

15860-432: Was echoed by Coward. He had not been able to attend rehearsals and saw the piece for the first time on the second night of the run; he later wrote: In the US in the 1940s Lillian Gish played Eloise in an out-of-town production, which she wanted to bring into New York, but was prevented from doing so by a veto from Coward, for reasons that are not recorded. Mabel Albertson played Eloise opposite George Reeves as Raoul in

15990-418: Was expected of me. Part of the job." Time concluded, "Coward's greatest single gift has not been writing or composing, not acting or directing, but projecting a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise." Coward's distinctive clipped diction arose from his childhood: his mother was deaf and Coward developed his staccato style of speaking to make it easier for her to hear what he

16120-480: Was in the care of the orphanage. He became Collinson's godfather and helped him to get started in show business. When Collinson was a successful director, he invited Coward to play a role in The Italian Job . Graham Payn also played a small role in the film. In 1926, Coward acquired Goldenhurst Farm , in Aldington, Kent , making it his home for most of the next thirty years, except when the military used it during

16250-519: Was not a spinet in the sense given above, but rather a virginal ; its strings were parallel to the keyboard. Typically, the pentagonal spinet was more compact than other types of virginals, as the pentagon shape arose from lopping off the corners of the original rectangular virginal design. More generally, the word spinet was not always very sharply defined in former times, particularly in its French and Italian cognate forms épinette and spinetta . Thus, for example, when Bartolomeo Cristofori invented

16380-524: Was really quite good in it, owing to the kindness and care of Hawtrey's direction. He took endless trouble with me   ... and taught me during those two short weeks many technical points of comedy acting which I use to this day." In 1918, Coward was conscripted into the Artists Rifles but was assessed as unfit for active service because of a tubercular tendency, and he was discharged on health grounds after nine months. That year he appeared in

16510-425: Was saying; it also helped him eradicate a slight lisp. His nickname, "The Master", "started as a joke and became true", according to Coward. It was used of him from the 1920s onwards. Coward himself made light of it: when asked by a journalist why he was known as "The Master", he replied, "Oh, you know – Jack of all trades, master of none." He could, however, joke about his own immodesty: "My sense of my importance to

16640-562: Was the last musical he premiered in the West End; his last two musicals were first produced on Broadway. Sail Away (1961), set on a luxury cruise liner, was Coward's most successful post-war musical, with productions in America, Britain and Australia. The Girl Who Came to Supper , a musical adaptation of The Sleeping Prince (1963), ran for only three months. He directed the successful 1964 Broadway musical adaptation of Blithe Spirit , called High Spirits . Coward's late plays include

16770-419: Was to use his celebrity to influence American public and political opinion in favour of helping Britain. He was frustrated by British press criticism of his foreign travel while his countrymen suffered at home, but he was unable to reveal that he was acting on behalf of the Secret Service. In 1942 George VI wished to award Coward a knighthood for his efforts, but was dissuaded by Winston Churchill . Mindful of

16900-493: Was widely admired and loved for his generosity and kindness to those who fell on hard times. Stories are told of the unobtrusive way in which he relieved the needs or paid the debts of old theatrical acquaintances who had no claim on him. From 1934 until 1956, Coward was the president of the Actors Orphanage , which was supported by the theatrical industry. In that capacity, he befriended the young Peter Collinson , who

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