The Letters of Noel Coward

by Noel Coward

  In the end Noël did not make the trip after all but it was he who summarized the affair in a letter to Jack:

  Dearest Dab,

  You entirely misunderstood my motives in wishing to come over and see Island Fling, In the first place I had re-read the play carefully on my way down to stay with Binkie and realized that, although the last act got under way and had a lot of good stuff in it, the first act was heavy, over-written and dull. (I later discovered that you had changed the play into three acts which was a wise decision). When your cable arrived at Binkie's saying “Triumphant success, future plans indefinite etc., etc.,” both Binkie and I decided that it was essential for me to see the play and discover where and how to re-write it before it was possibly played on the coast by Claudette or ultimately here in England by someone else.

  Unfortunately, I told Natasha in Paris that I was popping over and why, and she implored me not to, saying that it would upset you, etc. This not unnaturally irritated me and, aided by a few nips of the demon Vodka I flew at her and she at me and we had a fine old scene lasting about twenty minutes, after which we giggled and Niki said it was just like old times at Fairfield! I presume that she warned you that I was on the war path. This I think, although well meant, was foolish of her because it gave you the impression that I was coming over determined not to like your production of the play. This was not true, although I must admit that from what both she and Niki told me about the cast, I was a little apprehensive. By this time I had already telephoned Lorn and my reservations on the plane were made and paid for. Then I came back and read your really quite insufferable and hysterical cables and cancelled my reservations.

  I did not reply to them because your emphasis on the expense you were “ill able to afford” and your assumption that I would “automatically detest” your production, made me very angry. In the first place I would not automatically detest your production, as I am neither prejudiced, malicious nor silly, although if it was as bad as your curious behaviour has now convinced me that it was, I should have certainly detested it and said so in no uncertain terms. After all it is my play and I didn't ask you to do it, you asked me. The play has been read by Larry [Olivier], Vivien [Leigh], Leonora [Corbett], Gertie and Ina [Claire] and they none of them cared for it. This had already convinced me that there was something wrong with it and all I wanted to do was to see it with an audience re-action and find out if it was worth salvaging. I was also anxious to see Claudette with an eye to possible future casting. As far as the “expense” was concerned, my visit would have cost you bed and board at Fairfield for three or four days. In any event I would like to remind you that the financial burden of twenty-six years of association has been weighted far more heavily on my side than on yours.

  Present circumstances are difficult but however difficult they are and continue to be, I promise you that as soon as I possibly can the existing situation will be tidied up for good and all and you need have no further financial anxieties as far as I am concerned. You say that you “get nothing” out of Island Fling and gave up six weeks of your summer to it. Well, dear boy, what you got out of it was a record breaking success for the Westport Theatre of which you are a director, a great deal of reclame and, I presume, at the end of the season, a modest addition to the kitty. The notices also, from my point of view, were far better than I expected them to be, and from your point of view, excellent. Now unhappily, owing to your lack of moral courage, I have no way of judging for myself whether your production was good, bad or indifferent, all I have to go on are reports from outsiders which, I must admit, are coming in thick and fast.

  With regard to your suggestion that we sever our Theatrical association, I would like to know how really carefully you have thought about this and whether or not you truly mean it. From many angles I think it would be an excellent idea but please remember that the suggestion came from you and not from me. If in your mind I have become so unreasonable, prejudiced and fearsome in Theatrical affairs that you find any discussion of them too much of a strain, I quite agree that the sooner we pack it up the better.

  At this time Jack was continually ill with a variety of reported conditions, all of which Noël suspected were another way of camouflaging his increasing alcoholism. In February 1952: “went to see Jack. He is obviously fairly ill, although I am not sure how bad really. His hair is white and he looks like an old man.” He was, in fact, only fifty-three but was “becoming an egocentric bore.”

  By the end of the following year things had deteriorated still further. Arriving in New York, Noël went round to see Jack and Natasha and found “They were both fried and not making sense … I was really worried about darling Natasha, who looked puffy and jittery. Jack was as he usually is when he has had too much, petulant and silly.”

  In 1954:

  It is a dismal sight to see him now and remember how handsome and amusing he once was. He has changed in every way so shatteringly that it is only occasionally that I can catch a glimpse of what he used to be … I am deeply sad about this. It is difficult to believe that the snows of yester-year should vanish so completely. He meant so much to me for so many years….

  In the same year Transatlantic Productions was formally dissolved.

  There was more in the same vein, all of it charting the one-way downward track that Jack was following and where he was taking Natasha. Still, there were occasional meetings when Noël would try to convince himself that corners had been turned.

  In early 1957 Natasha took a much-needed break and visited Noël in Jamaica on her own. When she returned to New York she wrote that when she saw Jack she was “… aghast and speechless with horror.” The office must certainly be closed, and she begged Noël to have Lorn advise Jack to that effect, since he trusted her implicitly.

  Later there seemed to be a remission of sorts. Jack was his old self again, Natasha reported. The puffy cheeks had gone; he no longer repeated himself—he looked ten years younger. It was such a relief after the Jack she had seen at the hospital, where he had been having hallucinations and claimed that strange masked people were breaking into his room and preventing him from sleeping. His doctor had told her that her husband was a mental case and should be committed forthwith.

  The owners of the play he was engaged to produce had fired him summarily and, while Natasha had always considered the Westport Theatre “a stinkpot,” the fact remained that if Equity were to have heard of the situation officially, Jack would undoubtedly have been barred for life. All of this—touch wood—was fortunately now in the past.

  Another painful incident played into my hands—while he was at the hospital the people connected with The Empress [a play Jack was meant to be producing] came to me to say they did not want him as a director, as the managers [Lawrence Longner and his partners] had gone to Roger Stevens's [another major producer] office with the story of how drunk he was on the production of Star Bright and that they did not want him near Westport.

  In 1957 Noël finally cut the knot:

  22nd June, 1957

  Dearest Dab,

  This is obviously a sad and difficult letter for me to write and I have been hoping not to have to write it for several years.

  I am truly sorry but I really cannot allow you to present me on Broadway or my plays. I have tried for such a long, long while to stop you drinking and to persuade you to go on a really definite cure but I have not succeeded. When you returned from Jamaica last year I had great hopes that all was well. That was why I suggested you presenting South Sea Bubble, When I arrived back in New York from Bermuda and discussed the casting of the play with you I found to my dismay that you were not making sense and that you were also drinking again and pretending that you weren't.

  I cannot in fairness to everyone concerned make a reappearance on Broadway after twenty years under a management that I cannot trust. This may sound very brutal to you but I am afraid I must tell you the truth as I see it and as I feel it. For you nominally to present a play is not enough and I thin
k whoever does the work on my behalf should have the just kudos of presenting me.

  This situation has been making me very unhappy for a long while. I have discussed it exhaustively with Natasha, Mrs. Bent [Jack's longtime secretary] and they have agreed with me that owing to your many years of drinking you have ruined your health to such an extent that you're no longer capable of presenting my plays, or for that matter anybody else's. Face-saving seems to me, who love the Theatre, to be a waste of time.

  I had hoped that you had realized some time ago that the time had come for us to part as far as the Theatre is concerned; incidentally, you suggested this yourself when you presented Island Fling at West-port and refused to allow me to come over and see it. After this you presented Quadrille and lost the Lunts. I would also like to remind you that since the War you have had every opportunity of presenting my plays, such as Relative Values, Peace in Our Time, etc., but in those years you didn't seem interested.

  I cannot tell you the misery it gives me to have to write to you so bluntly but, oh, my dear, there is really no alternative. I know by this I am delivering you a body-blow and I have, as I said before, been hoping against hope that I would not have to. I am desperately, desperately sorry but there really isn't anything more to be said.

  All my love,

  POPPA

  In October 1961, “Natasha found Jack dead on the floor of his bedroom.” In his Diary Noël reflected for the last time:

  I cannot feel sad that he is dead. He has been less than half alive for the last ten years, a trouble and a bore to himself and to everyone else. Naturally, now that he is dead, my mind is inclined to skip the disintegration and fly back to when he was handsome, witty, charming, good company. What a hideous, foolish waste of life! His character was never good. Perhaps he knew that, perhaps he knew something unpleasant about himself which served as an excuse for drinking. I am almost sure he was aware of inadequacy … Of course I am sad. Of course I feel horrid inside. But not nearly as much as I might have. To me he died years ago.

  Lorn Loraine (left), Noël's shield and defender for forty years, works with her assistant and successor, Joan Sparks (Hirst), in their Burton Mews office.

  Not that he needed to be convinced, but Jack's increasingly unpredictable behavior highlighted for Noël the pivotal role Lornie played in his life.

  In Present Laughter he gave her a theatrical incarnation as Monica Reed, Girl Friday to actor Garry Essendine (aka Noël Coward). Early in the play there is an exchange between Daphne, a smitten fan of Garry's, and Monica:

  DAPHNE: I think he's even more charming off the stage than on, don't you?

  MONICA: {with a slight smile) I can never quite make up my mind.

  DAPHNE: I expect you know him better than anybody.

  MONICA: Less intimately than some, better than most.

  In fact, Lorn Loraine knew the man Noël had become better than anyone.

  Despite its deeply professional nature, there was a childlike quality to their relationship, which was common to all who were admitted to the inner circle of Noël's created family—Gladys Calthrop (“Blackie”), Joyce Carey (“Doycie”), and, later, Cole Lesley (“Coley” or “Toley”) and Graham Payn (“Little Lad”). It was like being invited to join an exclusive club and being given your own password.

  It was a concept worthy of J. M. Barrie.

  For the nearly forty years they worked together, Noël and Lorn would indulge in an ongoing game of Charades in which Noël was the omniscient but kindly “Master” tolerating Lorn, the hapless servant. It was a typically English way of cloaking the deep affection that could never be adequately expressed.

  Noël might write about their invariable morning ritual, when Lorn would bring him the day's post:

  Here I sweetly lie in bed

  And wait for Lornie's dancing tread.

  Here in bed I sweetly lie

  Anticipating Lornie's high

  Well modulated senseless bray

  Mouthing the topics of the day.

  Or:

  REFLECTIONS BY MASTER ON AWAKENING

  A lovely lady dressed in blue

  Has come to have a chat with you.

  The answer to my deepest prayers

  Is now advancing up the stairs.

  A little grunt, a stretch, a yawn,

  And then—heigh-ho! For tea with Lorn!

  That which supplies my carnal needs

  Is Lorn when hung with coloured beads.

  Rather more surprising is:

  A TRIBUTE TO LORN FROM MASTER

  Through all these weary working days

  Of toil and strife and strain

  There's one who all fatigue allays

  And makes me gay again.

  Her dainty, happy little face

  Is Youth personified

  I really could not stand the pace

  Without her by my side

  Her lissome grace enchants my eyes

  When I am tired and worn

  I cannot over-emphasize

  My gratitude to Lorn.

  … until one notices that the Tribute to Lorn is by Lorn.

  Even when there was serious work on hand the tone was still playful.

  As the years went by Lorn increasingly doubled as Mother Hen as well as Girl Friday.

  Now, Master dear, when next you do your packing

  And you and Cole in solemn conclave sit

  Please see that no essential thing is lacking

  That should be in your luggage, gear or kit,

  Please pack your peeper wash, your solo denture,

  Your ointment, just in case of you know what,

  And thus be sure before you start your venture

  That all the things you're going to want you've got.

  More than most people, Noël needed the stability of his own kind of domestic ritual, which Lorn in particular symbolized.

  It was the war years that brought the degree of his dependence home to him. During an intense theatrical tour in 1943 he was forced to recuperate in isolation at a hotel in Tintagel, Cornwall. From there he wrote to Lorn:

  In the deep hush before the dawn

  I hear the seagulls screaming “Lorn”.

  A baby hare cries on the leas

  “Where is your secretary, please?”

  A rain-drop on my window pane

  Spells as it trickles—“L. Loraine”

  Small shell-fish moan on rocky shores

  “How is that pretty friend of yours?”

  All residents at this hotel

  Squeal at each meal—“Is Lornie well?”

  A foreign snail squeaks from its shell

  “Comme elle est belle! Comme elle est belle!”

  But no wild creature has the soul

  To long for horn as much as Noul.

  Then—just in case he has let his sincerity slip—the postscript….

  Kindly return these [food ration] coupons, you fat old trout, and get me some new ones.

  And so it continued until the Grim Reaper—as Noël always referred to him—decided to take Lorn in the harvest of November 21, 1967. In his Diary Noël recorded that he attended her memorial service. “It was well and simply done and quite intolerable. I staggered blindly away from it.” A few days later he is telling himself that “there is no sense in grief, it wastes emotional energy.” By this time he had little enough of his own to spare, but what he had remained hers.

  Goldenhurst was Noël's home in Kent; Burton Mews was his London office.—Ed.

  CHAPTER 4

  THE VORTEX

  (1924-1926)

  How can we help ourselves? We swirl around in a vortex of beastliness.

  NICKY, IN THE VORTEX (1 924)

  THERE WAS GOOD NEWS and bad news about London Calling! The bad news was that Andre Chariot—probably irritated by his reduced status as a mere employee on the current project—decided to put together a revue of his own for Broadway, made up of hits from his previous shows, and plucked Gertrude Lawr
ence out of Noël's show to be one of its stars.

  One piece of good news was that Andre Chariot's Revue of1924 contained three of Noël's numbers. So now, in a roundabout way, Noël had arrived on Broadway. Before long he had fulfilled his own obligations to the London production and took off for New York himself, where as well as renewing old acquaintance with the Lunts, Alexander Woollcott, and the Algonquin crowd, he met a host of new faces, such as the “beautiful, untidy, casual” artist Neysa McMein, Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary Pickford. He was also a guest at Laurette Taylor's Riverside Drive house parties, where guests were dragooned into playing her bizarre version of Charades. All in all, his few weeks were happily oversubscribed, and he was welcomed wherever he went. By the time he departed on the SS Olympic, he felt he had most definitely “arrived.”

  The second piece of good news was waiting back in London. Charles Cochran—Chariot's principal rival as a producer of revues—had seen and been impressed by London Calling! He invited Noël to prepare his next revue under Cochran management, and so Noël began a personal and eventually professional relationship that would result in some of his biggest successes.

  When On With the Dance was successfully previewed in Manchester on March 17, 1925, Noël cabled Cochran:

  The Vortex (1924). Florence Lancaster (Lilian Braithwaite) enjoys one of the few happy moments with her son, Nicky (Noël), in the play that made Coward's reputation.

  DEAR COCKY I DO HOPE TONIGHT WILL IN SOME SMALL

  MEASURE JUSTIFY YOUR TOUCHING AND AMAZING FAITH IN ME

  STOP WITH MY DEEPEST GRATITUDE I WISH YOU SUCCESS STOP

  YOURS AFFECTIONATELY NOëL

  Back in England Noël went to stay with Violet in Dockenfield, where he proceeded to write Hay Fever in just three days. If, later, anyone seeing the play should have noticed a close resemblance between Judith Bliss and her family and a certain lady on Riverside Drive, the similarity was purely intentional. The lady herself failed to see the humor in it for many years to come.