The Letters of Noel Coward

by Noel Coward

  Hotel Bora-Bora

  March 15th

  This is being a really wonderful holiday. I have tried to work but have not persevered because there is so much to see and do and, having come all this way, I don't want to waste any of it. I am absorbing away like an old sponge … The hotel, which is excellent, is run by an American married to a Tahitian singer … The proprietor, Alex Bougerie, has a speedboat and I have crept like a hookworm into his heart. There are very few other guests and so we spend most of every day in the boat cruising about the lagoon and fishing from the reef. I have never taken so much exercise in my life. Yesterday we paddled the pirogue-outrigger canoe out to the reef and back before lunch, a mile and a half each way! On the way we saw two huge stingrays having a go ‘Arry Boy with a third looking on. This could only happen in a French Colonial possession. We also encountered a very nasty sea-snake which I decapitated neatly with my paddle. The reefs are glorious beyond description, if you can multiply what we see at Goldeneye about twenty times this will give you a rough ahdee. The varieties offish are incredible and also the different sorts of coral. We went far out to the outer reef and I was snorkeling away doing nobody any harm when I saw, as in a dream, a six-foot shark coming towards me. I kept my head and slapped the water hard with my fist. It gave me a look of infinite disdain and swam under me and away. In fact the whole thing is all that one has ever dreamed about the South Sea islands. I am almost black and feeling marvelous except for my leg which, although better is not right. My bungalow is a goodish way from the main building and I have to force myself to go slow, Johnny. I smoked not at all for a month and then decided that it was too mizzy and so now I have my first cigarette with my first drink at sundown. My average is five to seven a day! I must myself say I didn't find it difficult and do feel the benefit, no more dry mouth in the night for instance. I am sure the leg is circulatory trouble and can be dealt with. I have a great deal to tell, I have taken five million photographs and am liable to be a great South Sea Bora-Bora.

  Love love love to all

  MASTER

  INTERMISSION

  A CHATTER OF CHUMS

  OF ALL NO EL'S many correspondents there were those who could write letters and those who were letter writers. Of these, one of the most engaging was Benita Hume (1906—1967). She had first crossed Noël's path when she played the uncredited telephone operator in the 1927 silent Hitchcock version of Easy Virtue. After that, she enjoyed a modestly successful film career, married Ronald Colman, and after his death, George Sanders. In later life she became a semi-invalid, but it did nothing to dull the sharpness of her observation on contemporary people and events.

  There were those who could write letters and those who were letter writers—one of the most engaging was Benita Hume.

  For a while she and Sanders were also Noël's neighbors in Switzerland, and she recalls a remark of Noël's, after a visit to the Charlie Chaplins (also neighbors), that Charlie's wife, Oona O'Neill Chaplin, “sat perfectly still in a cardigan”:

  The Chaplins’ house was perfectly gay

  And filled with all the old guard again.

  The actors re-acted every play,

  They shouted and sang of the days that were hey

  Wishing Irving and Tree and Pellisier

  Were back on the scene to be starred again.

  But Oona Chaplin sat perfectly still,

  Perfectly still, in a cardigan.

  Charlie leapt up with an entrechat—

  And I must say came down rather hard again,

  George sang “Because”—to not much applause,

  Then the children did cartwheels—and one lost her drawers,

  While Noël followed his secret heart again.

  But Oona Chaplin sat perfectly still.

  She sat perfectly still. In a cardigan.

  I'm mad about Maidstone … those marvelous shops. There is Mrs. Tiffin's tea shop next to Mr. Stuffin the butcher and right close by Messrs. Allchin, Smallcock and Cramphorn. “Fine coffins,” they add, as if that supplied some explanation. You don't get that kind of thing just anywhere. I had to go all the way to Osaka to find a travel agency called Wei fuku tu, for instance.

  We heard someone in America say that insanity is hereditary—you get it from your children!

  [1965]

  I am less tolerant of Christianity than you. I think it is the most appalling disease of the imagination. Rather like necrophilia.

  By 1967 Hume had had ample experience of hospitals: “They tell me that for people who really want to meditate the best bet is generally regarded as takine a room in a hosnital and rineine the bell.”

  In 1964 she and George visited Israel, where he was shooting a film:

  They've settled on a language no one has spoken since Abraham and you know the number of foreigners who are about to learn it you can count on the hands of one finger. Anyhow it is really only effective in the areas of hostile prophesies and gloomy exhortations. You don't have to catch much of the Old Testament to realize it's going to be rough getting a good translation of Blithe Spirit in Hebrew!

  Her observation of people was equally sharp:

  I met Truman Capote once years ago and thought him like a tiny tendril.

  Margaret Leighton … She's nice, isn't she? But thin, thin like shredded coconut.

  Elizabeth Taylor's rather voluminous top was secured at such an astonishing height as to give the strong impression she was wearing epaulettes.

  It was a game at which Noël could more than hold his own:

  Our new house boy (in Jamaica) was very tall, very very silly and talked like water gurgling out of a bath.

  Marina, Duchess of Kent (1906—1968), and Princess Alexandra. After the tragic death of her husband in a 1942 air crash, Noël accompanied the duchess on many social and theatrical occasions. Once, at a concert, the two stood up by mistake. The whole audience followed suit, thinking it must be the national anthem.

  Coward with Clifton Webb. Two very old friends, but later encounters were not always joyful. After his mother, Mabelle, died in her nineties, Clifton was prone to lachrymose outbursts, finally causing Noël to remark, “It must be tough to be orphaned at seventy-one.”

  Arlene Francis was archer than Waterloo Bridge.

  To Joyce (1966), Noël wrote that film star Gloria Grahame, in The Man Who Never Was (1956): “looks as though someone had not stepped on but slid over her face with very greasy shoes.”

  We dined with Mike Todd and Liz who was hung with rubies and diamonds and looked like a pregnant Pagoda.

  I have taken lately to underlining words here and there on account of admiring Queen Victoria keenly.

  In fact, Noël admired many members of the royal family. The Queen Mother apart, Noël would probably have considered that two of his closest royal “churns” were the Kents, George and Marina. George, the Duke of Kent (1902-1942), died in a tragic air crash and there were strong rumors, which still persist, that he and Noël had an affair. What is certain is that Noël and Marina (1906—1968) maintained a long and loving friendship, and he was her frequent escort on social occasions. She recalled a couple:

  I can think of several occasions which could be amusing to read; you and I trying to undo crackly paper from sticky sweets in the front row of the stalls at an Olivier performance, and getting hopeless giggles in the process.

  That time we were at a charity film performance and the drums started up, as they do for the National Anthem, and we both stood up and the whole theatre did likewise, and we muttered to each other, out of the corners of our mouths without moving our heads: (You) “Is it the Anthem?—are you quite sure?;” (Me) “I think it must be, but I thought they'd have played it at the end.” (You—beginning to lose control) “Do we dare sit down?;” (Me—panicking) “I don't think so.”

  This altercation having lasted about one and a half minutes, suddenly the band burst into some popular tune and we, feeling utter fools, sat down and of course by this time were shaking with supp
ressed giggles.

  A poisoned quill belonged to Clifton Webb (1893-1966), a friend of Noël's from 1920 revue days and a song and dance man long before he became a distinguished, if acerbic, character actor in films (Laura, Sitting Pretty, etc.).

  He liked nothing better than to retail Hollywood gossip to his absent friend.

  June 19,1954

  I understand that “Tits” Dietrich (she decided it was high time that the eye should travel north) is opening at the Cafe de Paris. I saw her in Las Vegas and I must say that such glorious sex and glamour has not been seen since OUR early days at the London Pavilion …

  It has been whispered behind fans that she and Tallulah have the same bust lifter. If such is the case, the result, as you will probably note, is most gratifying. I am not sure in the case of Miss D., but I am sure in the case of Miss B the confused gentleman threw his scalpel over his shoulder and called for a derrick.

  Hearing that Frank Sinatra was making the drug drama The Man with the Golden Arm:

  November 25, 1955

  It is only fair you dash off something for me—The Man With the Plastic Prick, It could be sensational, gorgeous and very sincere.

  The three most over-rated things in the world … “home cooking,” “home fucking” and “Texas”.

  Cooking at least seemed to strike a chord with Noël. By this time it was a favorite hobby.

  To Clifton:

  I hope that you are keeping up with your cooking. Here is a very brief recipe for a late-night snack:—

  Boil and shell, very carefully, one dozen eggs, and then throw the whole fucking lot at Louella Parsons.

  Love and mad, mad Mormon kisses from your drab, ex-travelling companion.

  Noël to Joyce Carey:

  There was an old Marquis of Puno

  Who said “There is one thing I do know

  A boy is all right

  But for perfect delight

  A llama is numero uno,”

  •

  EDNA FERBER was a regular correspondent for almost forty years. In the 1930s she shared her jaundiced view of Hollywood:

  [1937]

  Since The Charge of the Light Brigade and Lives of a Bengal Lancer the English colony behave like the Government with C. Aubrey Smith as Governor General and Nigel Bruce and Basil Rathbone running things. They refer to Americans as “natives.”

  On New York:

  [1960]

  The sun is brilliant, the sky a washed-out blue, the streets are being dug up in every direction in normal New York fashion, the sound of the steam shovel crashes into the brain as rows and rows of old brownstone fronts are demolished to be replaced with “luxury” apartments made of Jello and held together, evidently, with chewing gum and spit.

  On pagan festivals:

  [1962]

  The family here tomorrow for Thanksgiving dinner—quaint tribal custom which does not prevail in your land. I have just viewed the uncooked bird—a vast plump white creature that looks appallingly like a decapitated baby.

  When Noël moved into Chalet Coward, Ferber made a pilgrimage from the Palace Hotel in Montreux, where she was staying, to peer at the house in his absence:

  [1961]

  The house is utterly lovely, even though I saw it at half-past six on a dark and rainy evening with clouds sitting on my eye-brows, it was so livable, so beautiful, so right. The quality that impressed me most was its tranquility. One rarely sees a tranquil dwelling. I may move in, quietly, and barricade the doors and windows against your arrival. That failing, I think you should know that I've enrolled at the Girls’ School at Les Avants. I'm taking the courses in Character Crushing and Advanced Curmudgeonry. I'll nip over for tea every afternoon.

  She was well aware that her acerbic wit kept even her friends at a safe distance:

  [1966]

  All this sounds disgruntled, carping. Yet I am deeply happy to be alive. I am daily fascinated by existence, when I walk these streets, I am highly diverted, I love seeing my friends. I have a feeling of critically impending doom for our world and this depresses me, not for myself—I've had my life and loved it—but for the young ones.

  [1958]

  Then a little devil stirred in my memory and I thought, we-must-all-be-very-kind-to-Aunt-Jessie-for-she-hasn't-had-a-very-happy-life. But I rejected that. I have loved my life. The world owes me nothing. I've had a hell of a ride.

  On death:

  [1961]

  Myself, I just want to be put into an old Bergdorf-Goodman pasteboard box such as they use to deliver dresses, and that's that. Don't forget.

  •

  WHEN HE WASN'T making films David Niven (1910-1983) could turn a phrase or an anecdote with the best:

  The other night there was a sneak preview of Salome [a Rita Hay-worth vehicle]—all the studio executives were there and all was well when the big scene came up—the head on the tray department. Then a voice from the balcony said—”Dig those crazy hors d'oeuvres!” and the picture was blissfully wrecked!!

  [1960]

  I have started writing a play—the play of the century … at the close of the first act I have thirty-eight people, all of whom made sensational entrances, jammed like sardines in a decayed lighthouse. How do I get rid of the bastards?

  We have at Gstaad an influx of the remnants of the Kennedy family with Teddy still, last night at dinner, giving the British lots of free advice about the Irish … I gave a little back, suggesting that it was a pity the Irish hadn't infiltrated the English like the Scots had, thereby ensuring several Scottish Kings and Queens of England, many Prime Ministers and winding up with the best bisquit factories … not a big hit!

  In 1972 Niven made a Japanese TV commercial for a gentleman's underarm deodorant called Who's Who?

  It took three days and was shot in Eze village [in the south of France] by a crew of 24 Japanese flown over from Tokio. There I was (only to be seen on Jap TV, thank God!) dressed as a full Colonel in the Cold-stream Guards, busby, white gloves—the lot.

  A model peers out of the window as I march past—”Oh, David! I knew it was you! I'd know your smell anywhere.” DN {turning into camera and whipping out a bottle of Who's Who? from beneath his medals) “It's Who's Who” {Salutes—exits)

  Niven on Garbo (1972):

  G. Garbo came to see us (in Cap Ferrat) a lot. I really find professional grubbiness quite tiresome. Also, she's not very clever, is she?

  Which echoed a remark Noël had made to Joyce in 1967:

  Isn't it strange grubby people being so pleased with themselves? It's a thought for the day.

  1955- Old friend and another Swiss neighbor David Niven and his second wife, Hjordis, came to stay with Noël in Jamaica. Immediately upon their arrival, Niven succumbed to an attack of chicken pox and had to be quarantined. Noël wasted nothing: the incident was turned into an episode in his novel, Pomp and Circumstance.

  The Nivens moved into a new home in the south of France, where they found the concierge “a highly unreliable lady who wears riding breeches, smokes a pipe, and I suspect keeps a pair of false teeth in her behind with which she rips off the buttons of railway seats.”

  In the same establishment they hired “a titty Australian blonde” who proved to be unsuitable. This was confirmed when they helped get her a job with “some German on Cap Ferrat. Apparently, she had only looked after girls before and they had two little boys. They fired her for scrubbing their sons’ cocks with a nail brush.”

  Niven's elder son, David, Jr., was clearly a chip off the old block in Noël's view. He was also one of Noël's sixteen godchildren. Later Noël made him a present of a cocktail shaker, which bore the legend “Because, my godson dear, I rather/Think you'll turn out like your father.”

  •

  A LATE FRIEND was playwright and librettist Hugh Wheeler (1912-1987)—perhaps best known for his collaborations with Stephen Sond-heim, A Little Night Music (1973) and Sweeney Todd (1979).

  He was in the habit of regaling Noël with items from the medi
a that had struck him as amusing.

  Having seen Noël on Ed Murrow's Small World in 1959, he wrote to congratulate him. Noël, he babbled, had been a blessed relief after the nauseous spectacle that had immediately preceded him.

  Mary Martin had appeared in a show devoted to small children, whose serried ranks formed the studio audience. Mary had clearly not shed the aura of Peter Pan entirely, for her own performance—Wheeler reported— was arch and interminable. This caused the audience to peer nervously at the studio doors, which one had a suspicion were firmly bolted and barred—thus creating a truly “captive audience.”

  Another of “Little Bill's Boys,” journalist and author of the James Bond novels, Ian Fleming, was Noël's neighbor in Jamaica. When Fleming finally married Ann Rothermere, Noël was on hand to give the groom away.

  There was also a questionable clown who wandered among the children, claiming that the studio lights were far too bright, weren't they, children? But not to worry. With their help he knew he could blow them out. In Wheeler's opinion, for the amount of help the children were asked to contribute to the whole enterprise, they should have had an agent! On the clown's signal they all had to blow their little hearts out—and then Miss Martin would be able to appear. Well, they huffed and they puffed and they somehow contrived to blow Mary Martin on stage.

  But this was only the surrealistic starter.

  Mary then metamorphosed from Peter Pan into Cinderella—a role she had played in Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella—and proceeded to play all the parts in the show by a series of frenzied costume changes. One moment she was the fairy godmother … now she was Cinderella … now the prince. At one point, when she was both Cinderella and the prince, she contrived to waltz with herself! It was—reported Wheeler—”an Ein-steinian complication.”