Star Quality, indeed

"My importance to the world is relatively small. On the other hand, my importance to myself is tremendous. I am all I have to work with, to play with, to suffer and to enjoy. It is not the eyes of others that I am wary of, but of my own. I do not intend to let myself down more than I can possibly help, and I find that the fewer illusions I have about myself or the world around me, the better company I am for myself."

We went to the very last day of the exhibition Star Quality: Aspects of Noël Coward at the National Theatre last night. I figured I’d lose too many Princess Points if I had missed it.

It was a fabulous collection of ephemera, photographs and letters relating to the incredibly creative life of "The Master" - from his early years as a young actor, through his early successes with Hay Fever, Cavalcade, Blithe Spirit and Private Lives, the War Years (when he was not only lauded for his morale-boosting films such as In Which We Serve and Brief Encounter but was also acting as a spy for HM Government!), his friendships with Gertie Lawrence, Bea Lillie, Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh, The Lunts and Lord Mountbatten, to his later reinvention as a top-billing cabaret artist in Las Vegas and his private life with partner Graham Payn.

Star billing went, of course, to that dressing gown...



An incredible display - but one of the revelations that came out of the exhibition was his lifelong friendship with a very remarkable pair of queens indeed. Raymond Mander and Joe Mitchenson were avid collectors of, and enthusiasts for, everything to do with the British theatre. Many of the items featured in the exhibition were in fact from their private collection, which apparently has at its heart two thousand or more archive boxes containing playbills, posters, programmes, engravings, cuttings and production photographs of London and regional theatres, with files on every actor and actress of note in the British theatre, and sections on circus, dance, opera, music-hall, variety, dramatists, singers and composers, together with many engravings, figurines and pictures.

The Mander and Mitcheson collection

Although the collection is only open to researchers, which is a shame, it is a tribute to these two that so much of the history of theatre - and indeed Noel Coward’s own - might well have been lost to private hands. Hopefully one day, someone might find a permanent exhibition space for this marvellous life’s work - a Theatre Museum, perhaps? (Oh no, I forgot - the last one closed down thanks to a lack of support from the rich commercial theatres!)

Anyway, here’s a treat from The Master himself.

Noel Coward - Mad Dogs and Englishmen

Article from The Independent: What’s inspiring the Noel Coward renaissance?

Noel Coward website